The Chinese state-run newspaper Global Times urged the world on Monday, shortly before the beginning of the Iowa primary caucuses, to “prepare for the possibility of Donald Trump being re-elected as president.”
Trump, who served as president from 2016 to 2020 and maintained an aggressive anti-communist foreign policy, decisively won the Iowa caucuses hours later by the largest margin in the history of the Republican contest. As a candidate running against incumbent leftist President Joe Biden, Trump has prioritized challenging the Chinese Communist Party’s espionage efforts in America and seeking redress for the Party’s role in causing the Wuhan coronavirus pandemic.
Trump has also condemned Biden, whose family has been involved in business dealings with regime-linked Chinese businessmen for years, for being insufficiently serious in addressing the threat China presents to America and the world.
The Global Times routinely shames the United States for holding presidential elections, calling it a “low-quality democracy” compared to the totalitarian, repressive rule in China under genocidal dictator Xi Jinping. The newspaper called upon its stable of American politics “experts” on Monday to assess the Iowa caucuses before they happened, who lamented that Trump would likely emerge as the Republican presidential nominee and perform strongly in Iowa.
“As the US election year race kicks off in Iowa on Monday, experts suggest that the world should prepare for the possibility of Donald Trump being re-elected as President of the US and a United States that is more divided,” the Global Times predicted.
File/ U.S. President Donald Trump (L) and China’s President Xi Jinping leave a business leaders event at the Great Hall of the People in Beijing on November 9, 2017. ( NICOLAS ASFOURI/AFP via Getty)
“Chinese experts believe that judging from the current situation, Trump is unchallenged within his party, and once the general election phase begins, Biden may not be a strong opponent for Trump,” the newspaper continued. “This means the world may need to prepare for the possibility of Trump returning to power and a more divided US with fighting between the political parties getting worse.”
The Global Times refers to any public disagreements on policy between differing political factions as “division” and “fighting” that the government should outlaw.
The state propaganda outlet noted that not only was Trump significantly more popular than his remaining opponents – former South Carolina Governor Nikki Haley and Florida Governor Ron DeSantis – but Biden’s “job approval has hit a new low.”
“The polling data in the US is quite transparent, and Trump’s approval ratings indicate that he is still a very competitive candidate. The world should be prepared for this,” Chinese regime-approved “expert” Lü Xiang told the outlet.
Trump is so popular, the Global Times assessed, that the biggest obstacle to his return to power is the Democrats’ attempts to remove him from presidential ballots through the court system.
“The main problem for Trump lies in legal battles, Liu Weidong, a research fellow at the Institute of American Studies at the Chinese Academy of Social Science told the Global Times on Monday,” the newspaper reported. “For Trump, the main concern is whether these lawsuits will have a significant impact, especially if new evidence emerges that could further harm him, Liu said.”
Former President Donald Trump is calling for the Chinese spy balloon floating over the United States to be shot down. https://t.co/RRCNLNn4qe
— Breitbart News (@BreitbartNews) February 3, 2023
Xinhua, China’s flagship state news agency, reported on Monday that “experts” suggested Trump needed to “get 50 percent [support in Iowa] to demonstrate to voters that he is capable.” Trump must also remain competitive among Evangelical voters, the outlet suggested.
“This year marks interesting caucuses because evangelicals are not unified behind a single candidate, as they often are,” Xinhua claimed.
News agencies called the Iowa caucuses for Trump within the first hour of their opening on Monday. As of Tuesday morning, vote tallies showed Trump attracting 51 percent support, over 20 percent above his top challenger, DeSantis. A CNN early entrance poll found about 55 percent of Evangelicals entered the contest with the intent to vote for Trump, over twice as many as those supporting DeSantis. Trump also surprised pollsters by attracting more support from Iowa’s Republican women than with male voters.
“Whether it’s Republican or Democrat or liberal or conservative, it would be so nice if we could come together and straighten out the world and straighten out the problems and straighten out all of the death and destruction that we’re witnessing,” Trump said in his victory speech on Monday night.
Former President Donald Trump’s use of the term “China virus” last year as a descriptive for the coronavirus has sparked a lawsuit by a civil rights group. https://t.co/7TJboSoKQB
— Breitbart News (@BreitbartNews) May 21, 2021
Trump congratulated his top competitors, DeSantis and Haley, for “having a good time together” and called for the nation to unite against Biden’s poor governance.
DeSantis and Haley vowed to remain in the race following their Iowa defeats. The fourth candidate in the race, businessman Vivek Ramaswamy, announced he would suspend his campaign and endorse Trump.
“There is no path for me to be the next president, absent things that we don’t want to see happen in this country. I am very worried for our country,” Ramaswamy said in a statement on Monday night.
“Earlier tonight, I called Donald Trump to tell him that I congratulate him on his victory, and now going forward, he will have my full endorsement for the presidency,” the statement continued. “And I think we’re going to do the right thing for this country. So I want to ask you to follow me in taking our America First movement to the next level. It did not begin in 2016 — it began in 1776.”
Additionally, a top European leader had this to say about Trump’s victory:
Europe is “on its own” if Trump wins the 2024 Presidential Election, says Alexander De Croo, asserting that the increasingly federal bloc should prepare for a future without America.
“Our democracies and our liberties will be put to the test, not only with the election for this house but equally so for U.S. Congress, equally with an election for the U.S. Presidency”, said De Croo, predicting: “If 2024 brings us ‘America First’ again, it will be more than ever ‘Europe on its own’.”
