Republicans Still Can't Say No to Trump

Donald Trump has switched sides on the Korean Peninsula, threatened to bomb Oman, and took another, possibly fatal, shot at an already wounded NATO. Yet there’s silence from Republicans.

Edwin Eisendrath is the former CEO of the Chicago Sun-Times and Chicago Alderman who hosts It's The Democracy Stupid on Lincoln Square and a weekly radio show on WCPT820AM/ Heartland Signal. Subscribe to his Substack.

No. It is a simple word. A common word. No.

There was a time when Republicans used the word frequently. No, we will not hold hearings on an Obama nominee to the Supreme Court. No, we will not protect voting rights. No, we will not protect the environment. No, we will not fund healthcare, or break up monopolies, or tax the rich.

But now, when Donald Trump’s insanity has the country yearning for no, the Republicans can’t seem to remember the word.

In the past few days, Donald Trump has switched sides on the Korean Peninsula, threatened to bomb Oman, and took another, possibly fatal, shot at an already wounded NATO. None of these make America stronger. None contributes to human freedom. All remain deeply unpopular. Taken together, these acts increase the chances of a global conflict of unimaginable consequence.

Yet Republicans can’t say no.

Worries that the United States is abandoning our Asian allies as the entire military apparatus heads to the Gulf are not new. But now it appears that abandonment is purposeful. Donald Trump ordered Pete Hegseth to back off long-planned joint military exercises with South Korea while simultaneously boasting of his relationship with North Korea’s dictator, whom he called “unthreatening and respectful.”

That is either a lie or a delusion. North Korea sent troops to fight against Ukraine, and it remains a major supplier of arms to Iran and to its proxies Hamas, Hezbollah, and the Houthis.

Not a single Republican Senator has said no.

Oman is a small, peaceful and beautiful nation that sits between larger contentious neighbors Saudi Arabia and Iran. It has developed defense cooperation arrangements with both the United States and Great Britain. Before the current war, it played a mediator role. It has never threatened its neighbors. It is no threat to the United States.

Now, as the 60-day cease fire — a deal that proved false from the start — expires, Trump is threatening to expand the war and “bomb the shit” out of Oman.

When Richard Nixon illegally expanded the Vietnam War and bombed neighboring Cambodia, Congress cut off funding and brought that atrocity to an end. They knew how to say no.

This week, Pete Hegseth sent NATO allies a questionnaire. As former U.S. Ambassador to NATO, Ivo Daalder reports, it does not ask about military posture, readiness, or similar matters. Instead, it asks whether each country is “publicly supportive” of Donald Trump. Hegseth sent the questionnaire directly to each NATO capital, not to NATO itself, in an effort to separate individual members from the alliance.

NATO, of course, has kept Europe free from Soviet, and then Russian tyranny. It continues to support Ukraine as the front line of this ongoing battle. Vladimir Putin has long hated NATO and worked tirelessly to undermine it. Republicans in the United States can’t say no, especially when Putin says nyet.

But they must. These acts undermine peace and security on a global scale, making the possibility of a truly unthinkable global conflict more, not less likely.

Thank goodness American voters will have a say soon. Unlike Trump or his GOP, we are more than capable of saying no to tyrants.

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