If there was one skill Donald Trump touted when he ran for president in 2016, it was his alleged ability to make good deals. The United States, Trump argued, had for decades gotten “ripped off” by allies and adversaries alike, who consistently got the best of the United States in negotiation after negotiation. The North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) was the “worst trade deal ever,” the nuclear deal with Iran was “disastrous,” and treaty allies in Europe and Asia were trying to “steal the wealth” of the United States by running trade surpluses and failing to pay enough for the U.S. troops on their soil. As the author of The Art of the Deal, Trump claimed he would put an end to free-riding, renegotiate bad deals, and strike new diplomatic agreements in areas where all his predecessors had failed.
After nearly four years in office, Trump has strikingly little to show for his efforts. For the past week, the administration has been making much of an agreement by the United Arab Emirates and Israel to normalize relations, a largely positive step but far more of an exception than a rule. In many more cases—such as the Iran nuclear deal, the Paris climate agreement, the Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces (INF) Treaty, the Trans-Pacific Partnership, and the Open Skies Treaty—Trump has torn up or abandoned existing agreements but not managed to put anything in their place. In other cases—including Israeli-Palestinian peace, North Korea, and Afghanistan—he has launched negotiations with great fanfare but failed to conclude any new deals. And in other cases—such as Libya, Ukraine, and Syria—the Trump administration has not really tried at all, often leaving the diplomacy to competing diplomatic powers such as Russia or Turkey.
