Sun Sentinel Palm Beach Edition
U.N. braces for Trump’s first visit
President to address global body that he has long derided
UNITED NATIONS — President Donald Trump takes to the world’s largest stage this week. And many onstage are worried.
Trump will deliver his first address Tuesday to the full U.N. General Assembly, an annual meeting that draws diplomats and leaders from 193 countries.
Neither Russian President Vladimir Putin nor Chinese President Xi Jinping are coming this year. That gives even more running room to a celebrity president who has shaken global institutions with his “America first” policy and whom diplomats politely describe as unpredictable.
“People are on tenterhooks,” said Stewart Patrick, an expert on global institutions and governance at the nonpartisan Council on Foreign Relations. “This is the most nationally minded president we’ve had in a long time … walking into the lion’s den.”
Trump’s aides said he will emphasize core U.S. interests on North Korea, Iran, Syria, terrorism and other key issues during a kind of diplomatic speeddating meetings that start Monday and run through Thursday.
“They are all very anxious to hear what he has to say,” U.S. Ambassador to the U.N. Nikki Haley said Friday at a White House briefing for reporters. “I think there’s a lot of interest in how the U.S. is going to do, and they’re going to find out we are going to be solid, we’re going to be strong.”
She added that Trump “slaps the right people (and) hugs the right people.”
H.R. McMaster, the White House national security adviser, said Trump will emphasize the theme of sovereignty in his bilateral and multilateral meetings.
“Sovereignty and accountability are the essential foundations of peace and prosperity,” McMaster said at the White House briefing.
Trump will meet the leaders of France and Israel on Monday. After his speech Tuesday morning, Trump will have lunch with U.N. Secretary-General Antonio Guterres and other leaders.
On Wednesday, he will meet with the leaders of Jordan, Egypt, the United Kingdom and the Palestinian Authority. On Thursday, he meets leaders of Turkey, Afghanistan and Ukraine, as well as South Korea and Japan. Mixed in is a dinner for Latin American leaders, a working lunch for African leaders and other activities.
Diplomats say they have learned not to overreact to some of Trump’s more inflammatory statements. Mexican officials, for example, have been at the bruising end of many of his tweet storms, but they continue to work with his administration.
“I think the world is still trying to take the measure of this president,” said Jon Alterman, director of the Middle East program at the bipartisan Center for Strategic and International Studies in Washington. “For a number of leaders, this is going to be their first chance to see him, to judge him, to try to get on his good side. … How that goes off is unclear.”
If the U.S. government decides “that it doesn’t care about the U.N.,” he added, “the consequences for the U.N., which is running operations in dozens and dozens of countries with vulnerable people around the world, would be profound.”
The jittery anticipation of Trump’s first U.N. appearance stands in marked contrast to President Barack Obama’s debut address in 2009. Received as something of a hero, he delivered an impassioned plea for international cooperation against global warming, which gelled seven years later into a historic climate accord — one from which Trump announced the U.S. would withdraw.
Secretary of State Rex Tillerson, who has sought to trim the State Department, initially planned to take a much smaller team of diplomats and subject experts to New York than previous secretaries. It is not yet clear how much smaller given that the delegation has grown in recent days.
Haley, for her part, has talked tough about changing the United Nations. Early on, she announced she would be “taking names” of countries that did not cooperate with the U.S., and she has attacked what she sees as U.N. bias against Israel.
But she also has skillfully maneuvered in the halls of the U.N., finding common cause with the new secretary-general, who took office in January and who has worked closely with her on reforming the world body.
“It is a new day at the U.N.,” she said cheerily. “It’s not just about talking. It’s about action.”
Peter Yeo, president of the Better World Campaign, which advocates improving U.S. relations with the U.N., said he hopes Trump’s speech will be “more on the teleprompter side,” meaning scripted, and less on the “campaign stump speech side,” or impromptu.
As a candidate, Trump repeatedly derided global institutions and international alliances, claiming allies and adversaries alike routinely took advantage of America’s generosity or gullibility.
Since taking office, he has wavered somewhat. Although he repeatedly condemned the NAFTA trade deal with Canada and Mexico, for example, the three countries are in talks likely to keep the deal mostly intact.
Trump similarly challenged the NATO military alliance that has served as the bedrock of European defense, refusing to endorse its joint defense protocol. But he later did so.
In his address, Trump is expected to urge other countries to pay more into the U.N. budget, much as he did at NATO, and call for streamlining operations.