No good can come from embracing Donald Trump - Lorna Slater
We are all familiar with Donald Trump’s style of leadership. He divides, he bullies, and he punches down.
He is actively fostering an oligarchy in the US, where billionaires curry favour by donating to his campaign and using their media empires to amplify his voice and silence critics.
Some of the wealthiest men in the world stood behind him on stage during his inauguration in January. Yet this week, even the personal fortunes of the tech leaders has taken billion-dollar hits as US tariffs ripple across and destabilise the global economy.
Here in Scotland, as across Europe and the wider world, we look on with alarm. The situation in the US is bleak. With growing threats to abandon constitutional norms and whispers of Trump seeking a third term, uncertainty is mounting by the day.
Incredibly, the response of too many leaders has not been to challenge the chaos but to echo and embrace it.
In a newspaper column this week, Scottish Labour leader Anas Sarwar invoked Trump’s now infamous slogan, recasting it as “Make Scotland Great Again”—a phrase that sends chills down the spines of all who are fighting to keep Trump’s politics away from our shores.
No good can come from it. Anas Sarwar knows as well as I do that Trump is a racist extremist with a total disregard for human rights, our climate and the lives of people in Gaza and Ukraine.
But Labour is not alone in indulging this troubling trend. We must also scrutinise the actions of the current Scottish Government.
Just last month, the First Minister, John Swinney, met with Eric Trump at Bute House. He said that he met him in his capacity as a businessman, but we know what message it will have sent to people in Scotland and beyond.
Later this month, Scotland’s political, social and religious leaders will gather at a summit hosted by the First Minister. Its aim is clear: to stand united against the rise of the far right, to uphold our values and to reject modern fascism.
But we can’t stand against the far right unless we are prepared to stand up to a White House that is fuelling it.
As we enter the final year before the next Scottish Parliament elections, I, alongside my Scottish Green colleagues, will continue to stand for truth in politics. For equality, fairness, and a firm, unyielding opposition to the politics of division and of Trump.