Foreign leaders were reportedly told to praise Trump for winning the election
Foreign leaders who meet with President Trump this week during his first tour abroad since taking office have been encouraged to tailor their conversation to his personal preferences and knowledge base, The New York Times reports. The big three bullet points to remember: Praise him for winning; don't talk history; and keep it brief.
Leaders and diplomats who do not speak English must cut their comments especially short, said Peter Westmacott, former British ambassador to the United States. Trump is "a guy with a limited attention span," Westmacott told the Times. "He absolutely won't want to listen to visitors droning on for a half-hour — or longer if they need an interpreter."
Trump is scheduled to make stops in Saudi Arabia, Israel, Italy, Belgium, and the Vatican. Pope Francis, with whom Trump will meet for the first time, learned English as an adult and is not confident in his mastery of the language, so he often uses a translator.
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Bonnie Kristian was a deputy editor and acting editor-in-chief of TheWeek.com. She is a columnist at Christianity Today and author of Untrustworthy: The Knowledge Crisis Breaking Our Brains, Polluting Our Politics, and Corrupting Christian Community (forthcoming 2022) and A Flexible Faith: Rethinking What It Means to Follow Jesus Today (2018). Her writing has also appeared at Time Magazine, CNN, USA Today, Newsweek, the Los Angeles Times, and The American Conservative, among other outlets.
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