George Tristan: Don’t fall for the fear mongering about Trump

The following opinion was written in response to Sue Winthrop’s guest opinion published Feb. 27, titled “Trump, Putin, Hitler.” Her writing reminded me that there remains to this day a contingent of people who continue to espouse radical and often wildly inaccurate views of former President Trump. For example, Winthrop wrote: “If Trump gets back in the White House, our country will never be the same. Democracy will be destroyed. From day one he will practice revenge politics. Our country will be patterned after Putin.”

The far left has still not satisfied its appetite to use the threat of Russia (Putin) as a political weapon to influence presidential elections. Who can forget the 2016 election and the Russian collusion hoax that in the end was proven to be a Hillary Clinton campaign plot, using the fake Steele dossier to undermine Trump’s campaign, an act that should have landed her in jail. Then there was the Hunter Biden laptop and the 51 former intelligence officers who signed a declarative statement that the contents of the laptop hard drive had “all the classic earmarks of a Russian information operation” to tip the scales in favor of then President Trump, in the 2020 presidential election. It wasn’t until well after the election that the mainstream media was willing to admit that all laptop digital content was authentic and attributable to Hunter Biden.

The plan this time by the far left, going into the 2024 election, is to use the war in Ukraine to concoct a narrative that former President Trump wants Russia to win the war and that he would support expansion of the war into neighboring NATO member countries. A key talking point they are using is NATO funding and the demand by Trump that all NATO members pay the 2% of GDP agreed upon in 2006. While Trump was in office, he was successful at increasing NATO member financial contributions; NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg publicly thanked Trump for spearheading the effort. The same dynamic is currently playing out in the Russia-Ukraine war, the United States has to date, contributed over $100 billion, more than all other NATO members combined.

Biden would have you believe that we need to continue to fund the war in Ukraine, and send an additional $60 billion to defend their border, while we continue to allow an invasion at our own border. When Biden took office, he rescinded all of the Trump-era executive orders which sealed the border, stemmed the flow of illegal drugs, reduced human trafficking, and lowered the risk of terrorists from entering our country to do us harm. During Biden’s presidency, in excess of 7 million unvetted people thus far, have entered our country.

One of the first acts by President Biden after taking office was to shut down development of the Keystone Pipeline, while at the same time, waiving sanctions on the Russian Nord Stream II pipeline. Trump opposed Nord Stream II and was successful at preventing Russia from sending oil through it to Europe. The effect of Biden giving Russia the green light to open the pipeline was a Russian economic windfall, providing Putin additional military funding for the war with Ukraine. The same thing can be said of Iran. Trump enacted strict sanctions against Iran because of their state sponsorship of terrorist proxy organizations like Hamas, and to also prevent the fulfillment of their goal of becoming another world nuclear power. Biden came into office and lifted Trump’s sanctions, which has been an economic windfall for Iran’s war chest.

I distinctly remember after the 2016 election, that there were many saying that Trump was going to get the United States into World War III. The fact is that during Trump’s presidency, there were no new wars started; however, during President Biden’s presidency, there have been two wars started, and many believe that China is on the brink of invading Taiwan. Biden’s domestic and international policies have been a disaster. The world’s most dangerous totalitarian regimes — China, Russia, North Korea and Iran — see the United States currently as weak and feckless, and they are acting on these perceptions.

Facts matter. Don’t fall for the fear mongering.

George Tristan is a USMC veteran, aerospace engineer and political activist.