I’m not native to the US. My mom is half US and grew up in Mexico, came to the US to raise her family. My dad was raised in the US. So even though technically I was raised in the US I hold strong roots to my native culture (Mexico).

Regardless of that, and regardless of Trumps policies or his ethics regarding moral conduct, he’s an objectively bad leader.

Presidents job is to fairly be EVERYONES president in the US including; immigrants, dems, leftists, commies, everyone.

The US Is a melting pot, it shouldn’t be one uniform group calling for everyone to fit their political agenda or leave.

I think it’s honestly weird that MAGA supports a leader like this, “Make America Great Again”, by polorizing our country?

Of course this leads into policies and trumps unprofessional character. But that is my view on him, if there’s a Trump supporter reading this then I wanna challenge myself, why should I or any other democracy (I’m personally centrist) support a man like that?

What qualities does he bring to the table? What policies do you support? What about his character do you like?

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later edit: honestly dont know if this is getting any more views but theres 500+ comments and I only made this post as a sort of pastime. I dont have the time to reply or read all the replies. if anything has been posted after the 23rd of December I simply dont have the time to read, but thank you to all who offered perspective :)

President Donald Trump said interim authorities in Venezuela will turn over between 30 million to 50 million barrels of oil to the United States.

Trump said that the oil will be sold at market price, and the resultant “money will be controlled by me ... to ensure it is used to benefit the people of Venezuela and the United States!”

President Donald Trump said Tuesday evening that the interim authorities in Venezuela will be turning over between 30 million to 50 million barrels of oil to the United States.

Trump, in a social media post, said the oil will be sold at its market price, “and that money will be controlled by me, as President of the United States of America, to ensure it is used to benefit the people of Venezuela and the United States!”

https://www.cnbc.com/2026/01/06/trump-venezuela-oil.html?__source=iosappshare%7Ccom.apple.UIKit.activity.CopyToPasteboard

From my point of view, a lot of his big themes have gone the direction he promised. Ukraine isn’t treated as the same top-tier U.S. priority it once was, and there’s been more pressure on NATO partners to carry their own weight instead of assuming the U.S. will always pick up the tab. He’s also leaned hard into the free-speech debate and pushed back against what he sees as censorship and “approved narratives.” I don’t think he’s been as effective on that as he could be domestically, but it’s clearly a consistent thread.

Economically, I feel like things are calmer than they were at the peak of inflation. The border situation also feels significantly tighter than before, not perfect, but clearly handled with more urgency. And whether people like his style or not, he hasn’t been launching new wars. If anything, he’s pushed toward negotiation and de-escalation, including trying to move the Israel-Palestine situation toward some kind of resolution instead of just endlessly managing it.

Beyond that, there are a few other things I think get overlooked:

Energy & domestic production: He’s been very open about wanting the U.S. to rely less on other countries. You can see that in the way energy independence and “bring jobs home” keep coming up.

Trade & leverage: Agree or disagree with tariffs, he’s at least consistent about using trade as leverage rather than defaulting to military or diplomatic pressure.

Regulation & business climate: He’s kept up the theme of cutting red tape and trying to make it easier to operate a business here...again, people can debate how effective it is, but it’s in line with what he said he’d do.

Criminal-justice reform roots: People forget he backed the First Step Act before, which is one of the few bipartisan reforms in recent years. That doesn’t fit the caricature of him, but it’s part of the record.

Foreign policy restraint: Even when he talks tough, the actual outcomes tend to be more restrained than the rhetoric. I’d rather have blunt talk with less bombing than polished speeches with constant intervention.

People will absolutely disagree with me on the details, and I get that. Not everything has been done perfectly, and some outcomes are debatable depending on what numbers you look at. But from where I sit, he’s been one of the more peace-focused presidents of my lifetime, and he’s actually stayed surprisingly close to what he campaigned on. That’s my unpopular opinion.

I don’t mean this as a rant - I’m genuinely trying to test whether I’m wrong here. Every president has had scandals or major screw-ups: Nixon had Watergate, Clinton lied under oath, Bush had Iraq, Obama had drone strikes and surveillance overreach. But with Trump (especially now, during his second term), it feels like the entire idea of presidential standards has collapsed.

Here’s what I mean:

1. Truth basically stopped mattering. During his first term, he flooded the news cycle with half-truths and straight-up falsehoods until fact-checking became useless noise. In his second term, it feels like even his supporters don’t expect honesty - they just see politics as team loyalty. That’s not healthy for democracy.

2. He surrounds himself only with “yes men.” Almost everyone who’s disagreed with him - even loyal early allies - eventually got fired, attacked online, or replaced with someone whose main qualification is loyalty. That’s not leadership; it’s an echo chamber. Presidents are supposed to hear hard truths, not filter them out.

3. The self-interest is out in the open now. He’s still holding events at properties his family profits from, still blurring public service and private business, and still treating the presidency like a personal brand. I can’t think of another modern president who made the office feel this transactional.

4. He normalizes attacking democratic institutions. The constant feuds with the Justice Department, judges, the press, and even the military undermine trust in everything that’s supposed to keep the government balanced. You can’t run a republic on personality loyalty alone.

5. The new leaks (like those Epstein-related emails) Even if you take them with a grain of salt, the fact that this kind of thing keeps surfacing says a lot about the circles he keeps and the lack of basic vetting or judgment. It feeds the perception that nothing is off-limits anymore.

At some point, it stops being about “policy disagreements” and starts being about whether the office itself means anything beyond a political weapon.

What might change my view:

If you can show that earlier presidents were just as bad but we’ve forgotten.

If you think the media or opponents have exaggerated Trump’s behavior and it’s really not that unusual.

Or if you think the presidency was already broken before him, and he’s just the symptom, not the cause.

CMV.

It's hard for me to care if most everyone else doesn't care. I'm tired of being told I'm hysterical, or forecasting, or dividing the country by not thinking about the other side. I'm tired of having to explain why the big beautiful bill is bad or why tarriffs are a tax on people or why ICE violating people's rights is a problem.

I know there are lots of people that are fighting against the administration but they're clearly not showing up. Two large protests 5 months apart clearly shows people aren't THAT angry. Sure Trump's numbers are down and I think things will swing back to the democrats but I know that no matter what democrats do, even if they really fight to help working people (a big if) youre not going to meaningfully change the DNA of the voter base-a base that will throw their vote to any liar because of "men in womens sports".

So you know what, I don't care anymore. I actually start to get a little happy when I see how rural hospitals are going to close and how healthcare premiums are going to start to take off. Red states, including my own will have their kids start getting measles and all sorts of awful stuff..sucks to suck. I will check out and be glad that I'm a white man that's probably going to weather the storm. I'm tired of getting worked up and surrounded by people who "have no idea what to believe" or who think this is all ok because "they're all corrupt". So the only lesson I'll take away from all of this is that I'll take care of myself, my family and friends. What else is there? What are my country men going to do, not vote for a Trump guy in the next 3 to 7 years? Don't make me laugh.

Since 2016, I’ve consumed news with abject horror watching Trump’s policies as well as his personal life. For years, I’d say, “this is it. He’s done!” And as we know, there seems to be no bottom. Now I realize, it really doesn’t matter what he does. He has built a cult of personality and his base will follow him blindly, even if it disagrees with their core values - ie - freedom from government intervention (unless you are LGBTQ), America First (except farmers), and Christian values (but screw the poor, the hungry, the immigrants), to name a few.

At the end of the day, they will twist themselves into knots to agree with his statements and policies. Is it to own the libs? Is he just their team so they will always support their team? Or are they just ignorant?

Thanks so much everyone. This feedback has been really helpful. My main Takeaway, is that when Trump floats things that his base clearly disagrees with, he quickly walks it back. So it appears that they support everything he does, but he just doesn’t do many things they don’t support. And those things are mainly friendly to democratic policy, like Covid vaccines. Personally, he can do anything unpalatable, and they don’t care. It panders to their worst selves, and they can cheer that on. Also, I’ve learned that for Democrats to have any chance of winning moving forward, it seems that maybe they should just ignore all of the terrible things he does and says outside of policy and just focus on shaping their own policy to show they can really change the lives of working people.

Thanks so much everyone. This feedback has been really helpful. My main Takeaway, is that when Trump floats things that his base clearly disagrees with, he quickly walks it back. So it appears that they support everything he does, but he just doesn’t do many things they don’t support. And those things are mainly friendly to democratic policy, like Covid vaccines. Personally, he can do anything unpalatable, and they don’t care. It panders to their worst selves, and they can cheer that on. Also, I’ve learned that for Democrats to have any chance of winning moving forward, it seems that maybe they should just ignore all of the terrible things he does and says outside of policy and just focus on shaping their own policy to show they can really change the lives of working people.

And this is assuming DJT makes it to 2029. I hope DJT does. Because MAGots need to see that stupid choices result in stupid policies. The only exception being if he is putting Americans directly in harms way … like posting the movements of nuclear submarines on social media. That seems asinine.

Come 2028, DJT and his administration still won’t have released the Epstein Files or Epstein investigation(s) information. We, the public, still will be subjected to: “what about Obama and what about Biden.”

Maybe this is totally obvious, but DJT and his administration don’t want the Epstein information they are privy to in public … they clearly don’t want the public to know certain things that are contained in those files and investigations.

And why is this a problem? Because this administration will do whatever it takes to suppress the information for however long it takes.

This is why morals and ethics matter. This is why, during the campaign season, I asked Trump supporters I knew: does character matter? Those supporters were mum. I guess it didn’t matter to them. They were too busy worshipping at the altar of Trumpism. They were too busy believing that “Trump will fix it.”

Character does matter because skeletons come out of the closet … information does come out eventually. And the perpetrators want to keep those skeletons in the closet. And the perpetrators will do what they can to keep those skeletons from getting out. Donald cannot have his skeletons see the light of day.

Now we know for sure: Donald was directly involved in child molestation or he was adjacent to it or he was enabling it. None of these options are good for Donald. And he will do what he can to suppress information relating to these three options.

DJT needs power to keep his skeletons in the closet; he needs the presidency to suppress his culpability in the Epstein matter; he’s not going to just cede power; if he cedes power, the Epstein information is that much closer to being made public.

Once again, in the spirit of January 6, 2021, DJT will attempt a coup. And he will attempt to disrupt the peaceful transfer of power.

Donald must keep the skeletons in the closet; Donald must retain power; he needs presidential immunity; Donald will not peacefully transfer power in 2028-2029.