Speaker 1: Gilda. I'm Chelsea Daniels and this is the Front Page,
Speaker 1: a daily podcast presented by The New Zealand Herald. Donald
Speaker 1: Trump has made it through his one hundred days back
Speaker 1: in office and people are not thrilled with his performance.
Speaker 1: His approval ratings at the one hundred day mark are
Speaker 1: the lowest in seventy years, with only a forty four
Speaker 1: percent approval for a man who won the popular vote
Speaker 1: only seven months ago. It comes as his tenure has
Speaker 1: so far been dominated by tariffs and trade wars, cutting
Speaker 1: public services, gender mass deportations, and hitting out at his enemies.
Speaker 1: And the Trump bump has even taken on a new meaning,
Speaker 1: with Canada and Australia's left leaning political parties reversing polls
Speaker 1: from the start of the year to stay in government.
Speaker 1: But with roughly fourteen hundred days left in his presidency,
Speaker 1: what does the future for Trump two point zero? We're
Speaker 1: working through that today on the Front Page with University
Speaker 1: of Otago professor of International Relations Robert Patman. Robert, how
Speaker 1: would you rate Donald Trump's performance as US presidents so far?
Speaker 2: Well, I think even from the point of view supporters,
Speaker 2: it's been a rocky ride. It's been chaotic and shambolic,
Speaker 2: And that's not really surprising given the fact that mister
Speaker 2: Trump has put so much emphasis with his senior appointments
Speaker 2: on loyalty rather than competence. So what we've witnessed is
Speaker 2: a very ambitious agenda, both domestically in the United States
Speaker 2: and internationally. But there is a suspicion that the implementation
Speaker 2: of that agenda is in hands which are not particularly steady.
Speaker 1: Yeah, there have just been so many fit things that
Speaker 1: have happened in just one hundred days. Most notably has
Speaker 1: been the cuts to the public service and the me
Speaker 1: of course, so let's focus on Doge first. This desire
Speaker 1: to save billions by cutting services seems to have riled
Speaker 1: up the public a lot more than probably anticipated. There's
Speaker 1: been multiple reports of constituents confronting leaders at public meetings,
Speaker 1: reports of infighting between Trump's cabinet and Elon Musk. Is
Speaker 1: it a surprise that this has proved so toxic with
Speaker 1: the public.
Speaker 2: There, No, not really, because partly because there's a perception
Speaker 2: that some of the people like Elon Musk and his
Speaker 2: team of youngish software engineers who are overseeing as sort
Speaker 2: of taking a chainsaw to the public service. They're not
Speaker 2: particularly competent or experienced in the running of governance. Mister
Speaker 2: musk background is not in that area. Also, there is
Speaker 2: mounting indignation that mister Musk seems to be cutting everything
Speaker 2: except his own government contracts, which are extremely big with
Speaker 2: the government. So he is a contractor of the government.
Speaker 2: But there is a complict of interest here, and I
Speaker 2: think that's causing some concern. But yes, over one hundred
Speaker 2: and twenty thousand federal workers have been fired. We've seen
Speaker 2: important fassets of American soft power, like us AID, which
Speaker 2: is responsible for dispensing America's development aid around that that's
Speaker 2: been disestablished. With the loss of ten thousand jobs. That's
Speaker 2: going to have a long term effect on how the
Speaker 2: world perceives America to some degree. First of all, there
Speaker 2: is a sense that the expectation of DOGE it's been
Speaker 2: working for three months. They claim they initially claimed they'd
Speaker 2: saved two trillion. They then downlaid that claim to one trillion,
Speaker 2: and now it's down to one hundred and fifty billion.
Speaker 2: So I think they found all the waste and fraud
Speaker 2: that they claim. There has been very little evidence produced
Speaker 2: to back up claims that they have discovered such waste
Speaker 2: and fraud, and it's not very impressive making claims and
Speaker 2: not be aund to back them up. So I think
Speaker 2: that's contributed to a sense of uneasy. You know, people
Speaker 2: are losing their jobs and that is a concern.
Speaker 1: The economy has also been a big issue. Trump was
Speaker 1: voted in with a promise to lower the price of groceries.
Speaker 1: Instead is actually making everything more expensive while also tanking
Speaker 1: the economy. So why did he even choose to do
Speaker 1: this in the first place.
Speaker 2: Well, that's a very good question. Mister Trump and his
Speaker 2: supporters seem to have got it in their heads that
Speaker 2: the American economy was in an appalling state, when in
Speaker 2: fact it was the best economy in the world by
Speaker 2: every objective or impartial economic measure. So he inherited a
Speaker 2: very strong economy, but he now seems to be in
Speaker 2: the process of undermining that. And of course some economies
Speaker 2: are warning that America could be entering a recession, its
Speaker 2: economy could be going to recession. You only have to
Speaker 2: look at the stock market to see its cumulative hemorrhaging
Speaker 2: to realize the scale of how America's gone in the
Speaker 2: wrong direction economically, and that is you know, more than
Speaker 2: eleven trillion has been lost from the US stock market
Speaker 2: since mister Trump came to power. In general, yes, it's
Speaker 2: rallying a bit now, but it's lost the you know,
Speaker 2: it's lost a lot of ground, and the overall trend
Speaker 2: has been downwards. So it's having good and bad days,
Speaker 2: but the bad days tend to out and number the
Speaker 2: good ones.
Speaker 3: When does it become the Trump economy?
Speaker 4: It partially is right now, and I really mean this.
Speaker 4: I think the good parts of the Trump economy and
Speaker 4: the bad parts of the Baden economy because he's done
Speaker 4: a terrible job. He did a terrible job on everything.
Speaker 3: But sir, you acknowledge when you announced your tariffs, for example,
Speaker 3: the stock market dropped, it's been volatile. It has since
Speaker 3: gone up. Do you take responsibility that?
Speaker 2: Yeah?
Speaker 3: Do you take responsibility?
Speaker 4: Ultimately? I take responsibility for everything. But I've only just
Speaker 4: been here for a little more than three months. Yeah.
Speaker 1: Well, a lot of people who did support Trump seem
Speaker 1: to have turned on him over his handling of the economy.
Speaker 1: I've seen lots of commentary online from people saying that
Speaker 1: they didn't vote for this from Trump. They voted for
Speaker 1: him because they wanted to shake up the establishment. They
Speaker 1: wanted inflation to come down, they wanted immigration under control.
Speaker 1: But has he betrayed voters or is this kind of
Speaker 1: what we have come to expect from him.
Speaker 2: No, I think mister Trump, there were some things which
Speaker 2: he have you pulled out of a hat, so to speak.
Speaker 2: He's threat to annex Canada and also Greenland, as well
Speaker 2: as takeover Gaza. As far as I can see, there
Speaker 2: was nothing in his campaign that suggested he might do that,
Speaker 2: although he made threatening noises immediately after he was elected
Speaker 2: with respect to Canada. But on the other matters, Doge
Speaker 2: was certainly something that Musk and mister Trump had agreed
Speaker 2: even before the election. Musk was a key player for
Speaker 2: mister Trump's election victory. He pumped in about two hundred
Speaker 2: and seventy seven million dollars into supporting Trump, and of
Speaker 2: course was rewarded with a very good job. But this
Speaker 2: is very much a government by billionaires. I mean, thirteen
Speaker 2: heads of government agencies are now billionaires, and that's prompted
Speaker 2: people on the left of the political spectrum, like Bernie
Speaker 2: Sanders and Alexandria Ocasio Cortez known as AOC. They've been
Speaker 2: launching a nationwide anti oligarchy campaign. With respect to the
Speaker 2: question you asked, I think mister Trump indicated he was
Speaker 2: always going for tariffs, so that was no surprise. He
Speaker 2: often said, it's a beautiful thing, tariffs. There's two things
Speaker 2: that have troubled mister Trump for a long time. The
Speaker 2: first of all the perception that Americans being ripped off.
Speaker 2: All I can say, if America's being ripped off, the
Speaker 2: people respond deemed to be responsible for that. The rest
Speaker 2: of the world have done a remarkably competent job, because America,
Speaker 2: by the time mister Trump came to power, remained head
Speaker 2: and shoulders the most powerful country in the world. And
Speaker 2: the second thing was tariff's He believed that tariffs could
Speaker 2: correct the situation, and I think many of his voters
Speaker 2: did not seem to realize that tariffs are actually internal
Speaker 2: tax on American consumers. And there was a very interesting
Speaker 2: development where Amazon attempted to point out to their consumers
Speaker 2: the actual price of the tariffs that the American government
Speaker 2: has imposed on certain products coming from overseas, and that
Speaker 2: met from a very angry response from mister Trump and
Speaker 2: his press spokesperson Caroline leave It And as a result
Speaker 2: of that pressure, Amazon removed the explanation to their consumers
Speaker 2: in detailing the actual costs of the tariffs being imposed.
Speaker 2: So it is a sensitive issue. But yeah, I mean,
Speaker 2: I think many people took at face value his claimed
Speaker 2: that he could reduce costs, while in the next breath
Speaker 2: he was saying, I'll be adding some tariffs as well.
Speaker 2: They probably didn't make the connection between the imposition of
Speaker 2: tariffs and the increase in their cost of doing.
Speaker 1: It's funny that you bring up Amazon, actually, because I
Speaker 1: was going to as well. I know that there's some
Speaker 1: talk about Elon Musk not being particularly happy with how
Speaker 1: things are going. And now when I saw Amazon in
Speaker 1: the headlines, I thought, oh, Jeff Bezos was in what
Speaker 1: the front row of the inauguration as well. Do you
Speaker 1: think that he will continue to have the support from
Speaker 1: the likes of Musk and Jeff Bezos or will that
Speaker 1: linger for the next few years.
Speaker 2: It's difficult to predict. But what we do know in
Speaker 2: the first three months, those high tech bros, people like Bezos, Musk,
Speaker 2: Suckerberg from Facebook all strong supporters of Trump going for
Speaker 2: the White House. They have been all of them have
Speaker 2: been quite hit quite hard by the losses on the
Speaker 2: stock exchange. It's been high tech companies that have borne
Speaker 2: the brunt of that. Give you an example, when mister
Speaker 2: Trump introduced his tariffs on the second of April. Within
Speaker 2: the next two days, there were six trillion in losses
Speaker 2: in the stock exchange for trially of those affected high
Speaker 2: tech digital companies. That may be part of the reason
Speaker 2: why Musk is unhappy. I suspect also he's unhappy about
Speaker 2: what's happening to Tesla, one of the five companies under
Speaker 2: his control, which has gone through. I mean it's external sales,
Speaker 2: particularly in Europe, have collapsed, and people have been very
Speaker 2: angry about what Musk has been saying about many countries,
Speaker 2: including Germany. People do have real clout and they can
Speaker 2: exercise it by simply stopping buying products, which they have
Speaker 2: done in some cases. But yes, it's going to be
Speaker 2: interesting to see how this sort of constellation of high
Speaker 2: tech leaders in very big businesses whether they are going
Speaker 2: to stick with mister Trump through thick and thin. I
Speaker 2: suspect some may peel off, but others may believe on balance,
Speaker 2: the advantage is to be in a position where they
Speaker 2: can influence the White House or at least have a
Speaker 2: channel of communication. But yes, there's a lot of unknowns
Speaker 2: at this stage, Chelsea. We're only three months in the administration,
Speaker 2: or one hundred days or so, and so you know,
Speaker 2: a lot could happen in the next three months.
Speaker 1: Just after the one hundred day mark, there was the
Speaker 1: first administration official shakeup, with Mike Waltz losing his post
Speaker 1: as National Secretary Advisor in the wake of that signal
Speaker 1: chat leak and other scandals. Are you surprised it took
Speaker 1: so long after that scandal broke for a head to
Speaker 1: roll over this.
Speaker 4: Yeah.
Speaker 2: I think the circumstances relating to his remove. Obviously the
Speaker 2: signal gate episode did not help, but he is perhaps
Speaker 2: one of the more combatant and experienced people working in
Speaker 2: the national security field. Mister Trump, as one insiders said,
Speaker 2: likes his officials to act as staff rather than principles.
Speaker 2: There is a bit of a sus that mister Waltz,
Speaker 2: who came to the job with some i say solid
Speaker 2: credentials in the national security area, had quite distinct views.
Speaker 2: He was a hard liner on Russia, so he disagreed
Speaker 2: with the administration's softly, softly approached towards Vladimir Putin, and
Speaker 2: also he had views on other foreign policy questions. So
Speaker 2: he apparently was the subject of considerable pushback from other
Speaker 2: members of the administration, and that was why he was
Speaker 2: effectively demoted and given the job of US Ambassador to
Speaker 2: the UN, which is a high profile job, but clearly
Speaker 2: that was not what he was appointed for. So yes,
Speaker 2: he's one of the first casualties. I think the first
Speaker 2: of many. I think some people, I mean a lot
Speaker 2: of people are speculating how long can the sectory of
Speaker 2: defense last? Pete Hegseth. He was also involved in a
Speaker 2: second signal chat, which again contravene government regulations about classified communication.
Speaker 2: I don't think Waltz will be the end of it.
Speaker 2: Mister Trump has always had a bit of an uncomfortable
Speaker 2: relationship with his national security advisors. In his first administration,
Speaker 2: he got through about three or four, and there is
Speaker 2: a you know, mister Trump, I think is uncomfortable with
Speaker 2: independent people around him who challenge him. Of course, you
Speaker 2: need that for good decision making, and that's why one
Speaker 2: is feeling slightly uneasy that if mister Trump continues to
Speaker 2: surround himself with cronies or echoes, then we're going to
Speaker 2: have some disastrous decisions made.
Speaker 4: And remember this, this is Baiden's word. This was a
Speaker 4: war that was never going to happen if our president.
Speaker 4: This is a horrible, horrible war. And I get to
Speaker 4: see shots of soldiers through you know satellite that are
Speaker 4: so just so terrible. Five thousand soldiers a week on
Speaker 4: average are dying. They're not American soldiers. But I want
Speaker 4: to solve the problem Russian soldiers and the Ukrainian soldiers.
Speaker 4: And if I can save five thousand souls, I just
Speaker 4: love doing it.
Speaker 3: How long do you give both countries before you're going
Speaker 3: to walk away?
Speaker 4: Well, there'll be a time when I will say, Okay,
Speaker 4: keep going, keep being stupid.
Speaker 1: Well, of course, the other big thing with the US
Speaker 1: at the moment is how it is handling international relations. Hey, notably,
Speaker 1: there's been a lot of back and forth on Ukraine
Speaker 1: and Russia. You know, one minute he's berating Voladimir Zelensky
Speaker 1: in the Oval Office, the next is criticizing Putin for
Speaker 1: holding up peace talks. I mean, how destabilizing is this
Speaker 1: kind of flip flopping and lack of clarity.
Speaker 2: It is destabilizing, but it's actually showing the administration to
Speaker 2: be very weak, and that is the danger for not
Speaker 2: just the United States, but for countries like New Zealand.
Speaker 2: The Ukraine conflict, the outcome of that conflict is crucial.
Speaker 2: It has big implications for the Indo Pacific. Two of
Speaker 2: the biggest backers of Russia's invasion of Ukraine are China
Speaker 2: and India. And quite frankly, here we have the most
Speaker 2: powerful country in the world led by the Trump. Mister Trump,
Speaker 2: who sees himself as a strong leader. And what does
Speaker 2: he do. He coses up to the aggressor that has
Speaker 2: he legally invaded a liberal democracy and sides with the
Speaker 2: aggressor against the victim of aggression. Through Chinese non sentimental eyes.
Speaker 2: That looks like weakness. Yes, he has added, belatedly some
Speaker 2: criticisms of mister Putin, but the peace settlement deal that
Speaker 2: he's pushing is basically solving all of mister Putin's problems,
Speaker 2: and it's based almost it could have been written in
Speaker 2: the Kremlin. There does seem to be some reconsideration going
Speaker 2: on now by mister Trump. He has signed a minerals
Speaker 2: deal with Selensky's government, and that has, as you indicated,
Speaker 2: quite rightly, been some disgruntlement picked up on true social
Speaker 2: mister Trump's media channel of Putin. But I think it's
Speaker 2: been a very bad start, and he's also split relations
Speaker 2: between Europe and the United States. And really you could
Speaker 2: say this about his tariffs as well. But I think
Speaker 2: his foreign policy has at times been incoherent. He you know,
Speaker 2: the official rationale for coosing up to mister Putin's dictatorship
Speaker 2: is that the United States, what's the form a geopolitical
Speaker 2: partnership with Putin or something like that. According to mister Rubio,
Speaker 2: the sector of state in order to peel Russia off
Speaker 2: from China. I think that's unrealistic. But putting that to
Speaker 2: one side, China will see mister Trump's behavior as possibly
Speaker 2: well almost certainly as weakness, and that will encourage them
Speaker 2: to become more assertive in our neck of the woods,
Speaker 2: in the Indo Pacific and possibly in the Pacific Island
Speaker 2: Nations region. And certainly it could be expected to up
Speaker 2: the pressure on countries like Taiwan. So that is worrying
Speaker 2: ineffectively what mister Trump is not, you know, you're quite
Speaker 2: right use the term destabilizing. He's upended eighty years of
Speaker 2: American foreign policy, he's effectively he's dismantling what's called the
Speaker 2: rules based international order, which most liberal democracies, including our own,
Speaker 2: depend on rules are there for the week, not for
Speaker 2: the strong. But mister Trump's vision of international relations is
Speaker 2: very different from New Zealand's. He sees the world in
Speaker 2: top down terms, a world that's run by great powers,
Speaker 2: with America the greatest power of all, sitting at the
Speaker 2: top table and negotiating deals with the likes of Putin
Speaker 2: and China. As for the middle powers and the small powers, well,
Speaker 2: they will have to go and negotiate bilateral deals with
Speaker 2: the United States and basically get what they're accept what
Speaker 2: they're offered. So this is a radical break from the past.
Speaker 2: It's the most biggest change in the American foreign policy
Speaker 2: since nineteen forty six forty seven. And I think New
Speaker 2: Zealand will have to speak out at some point because
Speaker 2: what America is doing in its foreign policy is actually
Speaker 2: directly undermining our national interests. New Zealand, like many small
Speaker 2: and middle powers, needs rules. It needs institutions because they provide,
Speaker 2: if you like, a level playing field for small countries
Speaker 2: to operate in. And mister Trump seems to be determined
Speaker 2: to dispense with that, and you know, it does have
Speaker 2: real consequences for US. We trade with one hundred countries
Speaker 2: around the world, and I think there's now pressure on
Speaker 2: our government and other governments to bypass the United States
Speaker 2: and to protect their interest by upholding the free trade system,
Speaker 2: the rules based trade system, which many countries believe in,
Speaker 2: including China as well as the EU as well as
Speaker 2: many other countries. So, you know, I think we are
Speaker 2: witnessing not just destabilization, but perhaps a sort of fork
Speaker 2: in the road moment where America is parting company with
Speaker 2: many of its traditional allies and we're seeing an international
Speaker 2: realignment as a result.
Speaker 1: Thanks for joining us, Robert.
Speaker 2: Thank you.
Speaker 1: That's it for this episode of The Front Page. You
Speaker 1: can read more about today's stories and extensive news coverage
Speaker 1: at enzdherld dot co dot MZ. The Front Page is
Speaker 1: produced by Ethan Sills and Richard Martin, who is also
Speaker 1: our sound engineer. I'm Chelsea Daniels. Subscribe to The Front
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Speaker 1: tune in tomorrow for another look behind the headlines.