Over the weekend, political scientist Daniel Drezner became concerned about the direction in which President-elect Donald Trump appears to be taking his second-term foreign policy.
On his Substack page, Drezner argued that Trump’s reputation for pushing “restraint” in American foreign policy has always been greatly exaggerated, but that he has noticed a shift in tone from Trump in recent days that differs from the rhetoric he used during his first term.
“Over the past week… Trump has been making noises suggesting something altogether stranger and more aggressive: the territorial expansion of the United States,” he said.
Drezner cites Trump’s rhetoric about turning Canada into America’s “51st state,” as well as his threats to retake the Panama Canal and annex Greenland, which is currently owned by Denmark.
According to Drezner, several members of Trump’s team are reportedly on board with plans to launch military operations in Mexico.
“When it comes to Mexico or the Panama Canal, however, it is hard to believe that Trump will back down,” he says. “I don’t see Marco Rubio attempting to talk him out of it.
As I noted in the New York Times, ‘Mr. Rubio’s own hawkishness will mesh well with the MAGA view on Latin America; expect lots of American force to be used in that region.
“We’ll have to see how this pans out after January 20, 2025. It might not be worth anything. But I can’t help but feel that those pundits who truly believed Donald Trump would embrace restraint in foreign policy were duped.”
