Trump’s 'star has fallen' so badly allies are ditching him for 'political gain'

President Donald Trump returns to the White House, after Israel and the U.S. launched strikes on Iran, in Washington, D.C., March 1, 2026. REUTERS/Nathan Howard

President Donald Trump's "star has fallen" massively since his return to the White House, and as a new breakdown from The i Paper laid out, he is so "toxic" that even one-time allies are trying to ditch him for "political gain."

In the piece, published Monday, reporter James Ball highlighted the presidential election currently underway in Brazil, where left-wing incumbent Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva is seeking re-election against the right-wing Flávio Bolsonaro, son of former President and "close Trump ally" Jair Bolsonaro. During his recent acceptance of his party's nomination, Bolsonaro touted endorsements from the likes of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Argentinian President Javier Milei.

"However, there was a notable name missing. Bolsonaro made no mention whatsoever of Trump – a snub the famously thin-skinned US President will surely be furious about," Ball explained.

Prior to this snub, Ball noted further, "Bolsonaro Jr lobbied hard to get a picture in the Oval Office with Trump," while "the Trump and Bolsonaro [families] seem to have courted friendly relations with one another" for years now. In the face of all that history, he argued, "the absence of any mention of the US President, then, could not have happened by accident, and certainly would not be some oversight."

"There is, of course, one obvious solution to the mystery: Trump is simply so politically toxic across the world these days that even his closest international allies are having to distance themselves from him," Ball wrote. "This has been obvious in Europe for some time. Italy’s prime minister Giorgia Meloni so assiduously courted Trump that he endorsed her autobiography, while Donald Trump Jr. wrote the forewords to its English-language edition. Now, though, the two world leaders have a very public rift, with Trump claiming Meloni 'begged' for a photograph with him and Meloni accusing the President of 'completely fabricat[ing]' the claim."

One of Trump's biggest second-term foreign policy goals has been to try and use his influence to boost the success of global right-wing allies. Now, however, said allies are "deserting him in droves," as his influence "often seems to backfire" on them rather than helping them.

Ball concluded: "Trump’s White House has spent most of the last 18 months alienating America’s oldest and closest allies, in a bid to court a new international coalition of its own making. Now it’s finding even they don’t want to pick up the phone. Trump’s remaining days in the Oval Office could become very lonely indeed."

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