U.S. President Donald Trump at a White House press briefing on January 20, 2026. REUTERS/Nathan Howard/File Photo
Conservative-leaning New York Times columnist Thomas L. Friedman has little patience with conspiracy theories targeting President Donald Trump — but not because he is a supporter or a supporter. Rather, Friedman's view is that with Trump, simple facts are damning enough. And in his January 21 column, Friedman argues that although Trump considers himself an "America First" president, his real outlook is "me first."
Trump, Friedman laments, is so "self-absorbed" and such a "pathological narcissist" that he is incapable of putting U.S. interests over his own.
"Trump's worst un-American impulses and intellectual laziness were contained in his first term in the White House by a group of serious advisers," Friedman explains. "This time around, there is no one to contain them. He has surrounded himself with sycophants. So, Trump is now basically running our country the way he ran his companies — as a one-man show free to make terrible deals. That management style led to six bankruptcy filings by his companies."
The Times columnist continues, "Unfortunately, today, we're all his shareholders, and I fear he is going to bankrupt us as a nation — morally for sure, if not one day financially and politically. Trump's behavior has become so reckless, so self-absorbed, so obviously contrary to American interests — as even Republicans have long defined them, let alone Democrats — that the question must be asked: Is America now being ruled by a mad king?"
Describing Trump's recent letter to Norwegian Prime Minister Jonas Gahr Store — which found him complaining about not being awarded the Nobel Peace Prize, argues that Trump was essentially saying, "I, Donald Trump, am ready to seize Greenland, at the price of breaking up the nearly 77-year-old NATO alliance, because the Nobel Committee did not give ME its peace prize last year."
"If indeed America were a company," Friedman writes, "the board of directors would have responded to behavior like Trump's by announcing an 'intervention' with the CEO. Unfortunately, America's board of directors, the Republican-led U.S. Congress, has been completely self-neutered. And so now, we the people, we the shareholders, are about to get stuck with the bill…. The American people elected a man who, no matter what he tells us, is taking us to a future not of 'America first,' but of 'America alone' and 'Me first.'"
Thomas L. Friedman's full New York Times column is available at this link.
