Amateur Diplomats

Many elements of Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy's recent meeting with US President Donald Trump at Mara-Lago were disconcerting, if not depressing.

- Jan-Werner Mueller

For starters, no American official met the Ukrainian head of state upon his arrival in Miami, which stands in stark contrast to the pomp and circumstance lavished on Russian President Vladimir Putin in Anchorage, Alaska, last August.

But even more disturbing was the complete absence of trained and experienced diplomats on the American side of the negotiating table. Instead, there were White House Chief of Staff Susie Wiles and her deputy, Steve Witkoff, a real-estate developer with longstanding connections to Russia, and Trump’s son-in-law, Jared Kushner.

Amid all the damage Trump has done in the first year of his second term, the destruction of America’s diplomatic capacity has received relatively little attention. But alongside the gutting of the public-health system and the wanton abandonment of clean energy, it may prove to be the most consequential.

Of course, US presidents are entitled to appoint ambassadors to their liking, and many have chosen generous campaign donors. But these postings are always to less important capitals, where appointees perhaps can get away with a ludicrous lack of knowledge about their brief (something that Senator John McCain memorably exposed during Barack Obama’s presidency).

But, as is so often the case, Trump’s conduct is in a category of its own. The nepotism on display during his second presidency is shameless. Hence, he appointed Kushner’s father, a convicted felon, as ambassador to France; and he named his son’s former girlfriend as ambassador to Greece (whose citizens she once derided as “freeloaders”).