Few slogans have been so essential to the MAGA movement as President Donald Trump’s “America First” campaign promise, by which he assured his followers that he would prioritize U.S. domestic considerations above all else. But according to political journalist James Ball of the iPaper, with Trump’s latest venture to China, he has “betrayed” MAGA once and for all.
At the core of Trump’s “America First” messaging, writes Ball, was the assertion that “the rest of the world was laughing at America… and had been ripping it off for too long. America was being taken advantage of through dodgy trade deals and it was working-class Americans who were suffering… as factories shut down and jobs were cut, because US industry couldn’t keep up with international competition from the likes of China.”
During his initial administration, Trump suggested that the economic defeat of “China, China, China” was among his key priorities, and when he failed during his first term, he immediately hammered the country with tariffs upon entering office a second time, promising that the tax on import goods — which as Ball notes, “he wrongly seems to believe are paid for by foreign countries, rather than by American consumers” — would crush the Chinese manufacturing dominance and bring factory jobs back to America.
“Yet,” writes Ball, “when Trump’s supporters see the photographs of their President getting off Air Force One as he arrived in Beijing for his summit with Xi Jinping, they could be forgiven for feeling deeply betrayed.”
While Trump is theoretically in China to secure a deal that will benefit American workers, he’s so far primarily displayed his thrill at playing guest of honor.
“Trump was greeted by the kind of pomp and spectacle he so clearly admires,” Ball explains. “Thick red carpet rolled out from the steps of his plane, both sides lined by soldiers and then by rows of fresh-faced young greeters waving both US and Chinese flags. China is superb at putting on a show for distinguished visitors, and its leader is excellent at knowing just how to get the better of those he deals with. Trump, not a man known for his poker face at the best of times, could not be more obviously charmed.”
And now, to make a deal, Trump faces two key obstacles, according to Ball.
First, “for a President who likes to boast about who is or isn’t ‘holding the cards,’ he must be aware he is playing with a very weak hand indeed. Even a US Supreme Court as friendly towards him as the current one could not uphold his tariff plans, meaning Trump’s greatest weapon in his trade war with China has been taken away from him.”
On top of that, “Trump has disposed of most of the US State Department’s best professional negotiators, choosing to leave almost all global diplomacy to his billionaire pal Steve Witkoff and his son-in-law Jared Kushner. Both have had their hands full in the Middle East, meaning there is almost no groundwork for a meaningful deal in China.”
So his chances of striking a good deal was impeded from the get-go, and as Ball points out, further evidence that the trip will bear little fruit for the working class came in the form of the president’s travel companions, which include a slew of wealthy, powerful business moguls like Elon Musk and Tim Cook, as well as the CEOs of BlackRock, Blackstone, Meta, and Goldman Sachs — hardly the “real” Americans Trump promised to represent on the campaign trail.
“Trump’s political opponents have always tried to paint him as a bad representative for the working classes,” notes Ball. “None of this cut through — because Trump had a message tens of millions of Americans wanted to hear, and he did not seem to be part of the establishment elite. The angry reaction of many elites to him all but confirmed his outside status. For a time, Trump’s popularity seemed to be untouchable.”
But now, while there is a “sizeable ride-or-die Maga contingent for whom he can do no wrong,” Ball explains that there are millions of Republicans who are ditching Trump as prices rise and the U.S. finds itself once again bogged down in a Middle Eastern war.
“Now,” Ball concludes, “in the middle of all of that, the ‘America first’ President is getting a lavish welcome from China, having brought a plane full of CEOs along for the ride. Voters might not know exactly what that means — but at least some of them will know betrayal when they see it.”