Countries around the globe react to Trump’s departure

In Sydney, Australia, Lucy Sunman crawled out of bed at 3 a.m. so she could watch the inauguration of President Joe Biden live.

“The chilling effect of the Trump presidency has impacted us around the world,” said Sunman, a 36-year-old lawyer. “I cannot wait for some stability to be restored.”

In Seoul, 70-year-old Park Sang-ki sat in his cramped printing shop across the street from the U.S. Embassy reading online news reports about Donald Trump’s departure from the White House.

“America was supposed to be an advanced nation, gentlemanlike,” said Park. “Trump, he was like a gang boss.”

As Biden took office Wednesday, vowing to unify a nation riven by caustic political divisions and a deadly pandemic, the rest of the world watched closely, too. Many were happy to bid farewell to Trump, a larger-thanlife character who relished disrupting the status quo at home and abroad and who will be remembered as one of the most controversial presidents not only in American history, but globally.

“Good riddance,” said Nydia Ngiow, the former trade negotiator for the Singaporean government who spent several years working in Washington in her government’s embassy.

Not everyone was happy to see Trump go.

“We had a good relationship,” Mexican President Andrés Manuel López Obrador told reporters Wednesday morning. He thanked Trump for respecting Mexico’s sovereignty.

It was an unlikely about-face for López Obrador, a nationalist who as a candidate for president criticized Trump for his derisive comments about Mexican immigrants in the U.S. and who wrote a book demanding respect for Mexico called “Listen, Trump.”