Donald Trump was not yet two minutes into his first speech to the United Nations General Assembly of his second term when he credited himself for having single-handedly forged a world “that was prosperous and at peace.”
He was, of course, referring to his first term, which led into a screed about how the president who both followed and preceded him, Joe Biden, squandered it all … largely by not being him.
Then, in what became just the first of many instances of denigrating the country he once again leads — on one of the biggest stages in the world — the 47th president groused about how “four years of weakness, lawlessness and radicalism” under the Biden administration had “delivered our nation into a repeated set of disasters.”
But fear not, Trump went on, America has become “the hottest country anywhere in the world” during his first eight months back in power. At least that’s the reality in the ‘world according to Trump’.
And if that “hottest” line sounds familiar, it is — Trump has repeated the phrase at least 100 times since debuting it during his trip to Saudi Arabia over the summer. It’s nearly always paired with a denunciation of Biden and his former administration, and it often serves as a signal that the president is wrapping up his remarks at whatever event he is attending.
But today, it was just the start of his nearly 60-minute speech to U.N. delegates, following (by tradition) remarks by Secretary-General Antonio Guterres and Brazilian president Lula da Silva.
Both of those men spoke about the importance of the United Nations and praised multilateral institutions while warning against rising attacks on democracy and of the dangers of forgoing international cooperation.
Trump’s message, on the other hand, was mostly about Trump.
After more bragging about his administration’s record of tax and regulation cuts, he turned to another subject he enjoys talking about by touting how he and his Homeland Security brain trust have virtually shuttered the U.S.-Mexico border. Then he scolded the rest of the world — including Great Britain and many other close U.S. allies — that they are “going to hell” for being too welcoming to migrants, particularly those from the global south.
“It’s destroying your country, and you have to do something about it on the world stage,” Trump said.
In the same breath, after insulting most of the world, he claimed next that America is “respected again, like it has never been respected before” compared with last year or the previous three before that, the implication being that the only reason the world’s strongest superpower would be respected is because he’s the president.
From The Independent’s perch in the balcony above the General Assembly hall, delegates could be seen shifting in their seats and whispering to one another, perhaps uncomfortable that they were hearing what appeared to be a nakedly political speech meant for domestic U.S. consumption.
Trump continued by invoking his now-familiar claim to have single-handedly brought an end to seven intractable conflicts around the world as he pivoted from bashing his predecessor to bashing the very institution at which he was speaking.
“It’s too bad that I had to do these things instead of the United Nations doing them, and sadly, in all cases, the United Nations did not even try to help in any of them,” he said before offering the audacious claim that he’s no longer interested in receiving the Nobel Peace Prize for his efforts — an award he covets because it was once presented to the only Black person to serve as president of the United States of America, Barack Obama.
After a bizarre segue about a decades-old effort to renovate the U.N. headquarters and the relative merits of marble versus terrazzo floors — plus near conspiracy theory-level complaints about a broken teleprompter and an escalator that had stopped while he and First Lady Melania Trump were making their way to the GA hall — the president returned to his greatest hits.
They proceeded as follow:
— There was his oft-told claim that Russia’s invasion of Ukraine wouldn’t have happened had he been in office.
— Accusing the numerous countries that have recently recognized a Palestinian state of “rewarding” Hamas for Octover 7.
— An out-of-left-field declaration that his administration would spearhead an effort to enforce a longstanding treaty banning biological weapons.
— And, last but not least, the president got back to scolding delegates for being far too welcoming to refugees.
Citing a “crisis of uncontrolled migration” from largely nonwhite countries to Europe that he called “the No. 1 political issue of our time,” Trump accused the United Nations of “funding an assault on Western countries and their borders” by way of programs to support refugees making the journey to the U.S. over the last few years while fleeing war and terror in their home countries.
He also claimed Europe is in “serious trouble” and urged leaders there to be more like him by adopting virulently anti-immigrant policies.
“They’ve been invaded by a force of illegal aliens like nobody’s ever seen before. Illegal aliens are pouring into Europe … and nobody’s doing anything to change it, to get them out. It’s not sustainable, and because they choose to be politically correct, they’re doing just absolutely nothing about it,” he said.
He added an exclamation point to it all moments later, saying: “I’m really good at this stuff — your countries are going to hell.”
The president’s fixation on immigration policies in the U.S. isn’t new, but the rhetoric he’s used to talk about Europe’s approach to refugees in his second term has its roots in the racist “great replacement” conspiracy theory, which posits that shadowy forces are conspiring to replace the white people of Europe with non-white migrants from the global south.
But he wasn’t content to lash out about migration. Trump also denounced the global effort to reduce carbon emissions and phase out fossil fuels and urged the world to copy his administration by “getting rid of the falsely named renewables” because, he said, “All green is bankrupt”
And like the immigration issue, Trump had a solution to offer the world: Just listen to him.
Trump claimed that countries not “getting away from this green scam” by doubling down on fossil fuels would mean those countries would “fail.”
And like clockwork, Trump justified this by stating that he’s “really good at predicting things” while denigrating decades of climate analysis — much of it funded or supported by the U.N.
“It’s not politically correct. I’ll be very badly criticized for saying it, but I’m here to tell the truth. I don’t care. It doesn’t matter to me,” he said before adding that efforts to halt climate change represented “the greatest con job ever perpetrated on the world.”
“I’ve been right about everything,” Trump said without a hint of modesty, “and I’m telling you that if you don’t get away from the green energy scam, your country is going to fail, and if you don’t stop people that you’ve never seen before that you have nothing in common with, your country is going to fail.”
Thus spake Donald J. Trump.
