DC insider warns: Trump’s 'big ego' and foreign policy blunders put US in 'very dangerous position'
During U.S. President Donald Trump's first term, he drew scathing criticism from the late conservative Sen. John McCain (R-Arizona) — who believed that Trump showed great weakness in his dealings with Russian President Vladimir Putin. And now that Trump is serving his second term, similar criticism is coming from a combination of Democrats and Never Trump conservatives.
Two Democrats, former Sen. Claire McCaskill (D-Missouri) and Rep. Mikie Sherill (D-New Jersey), were vehemently critical of the second Trump Administration's handling of the Ukraine-Russia War during a Valentine's Day 2025 appearance on MSNBC's "Morning Joe."
The conversation came the week of the NATO Summit in Europe, where Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth argued that a return to Ukraine's pre-war borders is "unrealistic."
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McCaskill and Sherrill are both known for their foreign policy expertise. MSNBC pundit McCaskill served on the Senate Armed Services Committee, and Sherrill is a U.S. Navy veteran.
McCaskill told Sherrill and MSNBC host Mika Brzezinski, "The president's ego is so big; he actually believes that he doesn't need any allies around the world, and that puts us in a very dangerous position — the notion that he would begin ceding territory to Putin without even talking to our European allies."
Trump was highly critical of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) during his first term, whereas former President Joe Biden was passionately pro-NATO during his four years in the White House and championed NATO's expansion when Sweden and Finland joined the alliance. And McCaskill believes that Trump's second presidency marks a return to anti-NATO hostility in the White House.
"I mean, NATO has been a very successful military alliance," McCaskill told Sherrill and Brzezinski. "It is there to protect us, and it has worked very, very well. And the notion that he would try to go into a negotiation by calling our adversary and beginning to deal without even consulting our allies — or frankly, without beginning with Ukraine, who we have been trying to protect with American tax dollars since Russia invaded them and tried to take over their country in an illegal war. So it is really, you know, backwards how he's going about this."
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When he was on Fox News, Hegseth argued that women should not serve in combat roles in the military. And McCaskill, noting Sherrill's years in the U.S. Navy, told the congresswoman she is highly offended by Hegseth's view "that women like you somehow subtract from our strength."
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