Trump claims the US is ‘just so pathetic’ in ranting Newsmax interview

Donald Trump struck a less than patriotic note during an interview with Newsmax on Monday when he claimed that America was “just so pathetic” under his successor Joe Biden.

In a wide-ranging discussion with the conservative broadcaster’s anchor Rob Schmitt, the frontrunner for the Republican presidential nomination claimed that the United States’s status on the world stage has badly diminished since he left the White House in January 2021 due to, as he sees it, President Biden’s mishandling of the wars in Ukraine and Gaza.

“The country is just, it’s so pathetic,” he told Mr Schmitt. “And you know other countries are watching this…

“I’ll tell you what: I got to know [Vladimir] Putin very well, I got to know Xi [Jinping] very well, I got along with everybody, you know, etcetera etcetera, but they knew it was no games.

“I was talking to Putin a lot about Ukraine. It was the apple of his eye. There was no way he would ever have moved [against it].”

Mr Trump has regularly expressed his admiration for authoritarian world leaders since leaving office and has repeatedly claimed that Mr Putin would never have invaded his western neighbour had the Republican won a second term, such was his apparent awed respect for the former luxury real estate mogul.

Mr Trump went on to insist: “We’re very close to World War III. Much closer than anyone understands.

“The power of weaponry is so devastating today and we’re playing with a guy who can’t put two sentences together.”

Asked by Mr Schmitt what another four years of the Biden administration would mean, the Republican answered pessimistically: “I think the country’s finished… It’s not going to be able to function.”

Mr Trump then rather boldly claimed that “everything worked” during his