After reports that the Trump Administration is pursuing major cuts at the U.S. State Department, constituents have asked me to explain the “chaos” of Trump’s foreign policy. But when I look at his decisions, I don’t see chaos. I see the implementation of a coherent and dangerous neo-isolationism. Essentially, “America First” means “America Alone.”
At a time when China has already surpassed the U.S. in having the most widespread diplomatic presence in the world, the Associated Press reported that the White House Office of Management and Budget proposed slashing the department’s budget by almost 50%, eliminating funding for the UN, NATO, and other institutions. Meanwhile, Secretary of State Marco Rubio announced a reorganization that includes cutting department staff in the U.S. by 15%, while there are reports that the Trump administration is looking at closing 10 embassies and 17 consulates.
European leaders tell me that they do not believe the U.S. would fulfill its Article 5 responsibility to come to the defense of other NATO members, as they did for us.
Trump’s nostalgia harkens to a time when American strength was measured in dollar signs. “We were at our richest from 1870 to 1913,” Trump said in the Oval Office. There is an understandable attractiveness to this vision, but it ignores what happened in 1914 — the eruption of World War 1. At the outbreak of the war, President Woodrow Wilson called for “America First” and kept the U.S. out of the war. The famous aviator Charles Lindbergh and other isolationists repeated that call to keep America out of World War 2. But both times, the U.S. was drawn into the conflict anyway. The wars taught us that wealth alone wasn’t going to keep us safe from the dangers of the world.
The era of the great wars also saw the rise of American diplomacy. While it was military might that broke through the German defenses on D-Day, it was American diplomacy that forged the Transatlantic alliance and helped unite the Allied forces. After the war, American diplomacy gave rise to its greatest contribution in the 20th century: predictability. America created a more predictable world, and Americans benefited enormously. It generated unimaginable wealth for the United States by giving businesses breathing space to invest and innovate as well as access to new foreign markets. It drastically reduced global poverty and hunger, and helped prevent diseases from reaching our shores. And while conflicts still erupted, we saw an avoidance of catastrophic wars between major powers.
In the face of Trump’s zeal to gut diplomacy and international development, some of my constituents ask me, “So what?” My answer is that the president is like a builder blaming a wobbly house on the tools instead of the design. We cannot create the change we want and need if we are alone.
I joined the State Department in the post-9/11 world. I lived and worked on a NATO military base in Afghanistan, surrounded by coalition nations who rallied to America’s side after the attacks. Over 1,100 servicemembers from other NATO members died in Afghanistan alongside our American troops. Now, European leaders tell me that they do not believe the U.S. would fulfill its Article 5 responsibility to come to the defense of other NATO members, as they did for us. Who could blame them? Trump, when asked about his willingness to defend NATO allies, said, “If they don’t pay, I’m not going to defend them.”
Last year, a leader of a U.S. ally nation asked me a question that has stuck with me: “Is America a reliable partner?” He didn’t expect an answer; we both knew the truth. America right now is not a reliable partner. Reliability is the midwife to predictability. But due to the chaos of tariffs and the reductions in global engagement, we are quickly becoming a country that others, including our own citizens, cannot rely on.
Other nations, reacting to policies like the abandonment of Ukraine, are already preparing for a post-America world.
As a result, we struggle to address global problems that need fixing. We should respond to the inspiring yet daunting innovations of AI by working with partners to set norms for its use, growing prosperity for American businesses and securing us from its dangers. With the proliferation of drones and hypersonic technology, and the prospects of greater militarization of space and cyber space, we should reform security agreements to better secure American families from the changing nature of war.
Some of Trump’s actions could be reversed in the years to come, but others could do strategic damage to the U.S. that we will never fully recover from. Other nations, reacting to policies like the abandonment of Ukraine, are already preparing for a post-America world. The tariffs are causing them to realign their supply chains to be less reliant and dependent on the U.S. — and, in many cases, more entwined with China.
“America Alone” is becoming a reality, at the worst possible moment. The world is more dangerous than at any other point in my lifetime. Russia, China, Iran, and North Korea all pose incredible risks both regionally and globally. All four have demonstrated willingness to cooperate and even coordinate their efforts, as we’ve seen with Russia’s illegal invasion of Ukraine. Advancements in technologies like AI and drones are putting dangerous power in uncontrollable hands.
Yet in this critical moment, we have gone from the indispensable nation to the unreliable nation. There is still time to course correct. I urge my Republican colleagues to reject gutting the State Department and the Trump White House’s larger push toward isolationism. We should welcome sensible reforms for the State Department and U.S. foreign policy, but we should reject actions that will cede the ground to our adversaries and weaken our critical alliances. That will only mean leaving our kids and grandkids a world that is less secure, less prosperous, and less predictable.
