Trump: The Wrecking Ball Demolishing International Alliances and U.S. Electoral Institutions

In a now familiar almost daily occurrence, President Donald Trump has once again stepped into the doggie poop of his self-dumped international crises by ordering his Internal Revenue Service to impose a 30% federal withholding tax on Spain’s athletic championship team members after winning the FIFA World Cup final 1-0 over Argentina because the later matches occurred on U.S. soil.

I wonder what Trump’s taxation policy would have been if his favored team, Argentina, and his most beloved player, Lionel Andrés Messi Cuccittini (a.k.a.Messi), had won the tournament.

After Spain’s win and the team’s line up for the traditional photo, the U.S. narcissist-in-mental- decline attempted to place himself within range of the photographer’s camera. At that point, FIFA President Gianni Infantino signaled Trump to step aside. The final team photo on the right side shows only Trump’s elbow. The official White House version, on the other hand, includes Trump’s complete image.

Even prior to Spain’s victory, Trump spent weeks leading up to the tournament scolding Spain for not dedicating enough money to its military, and he even briefly threatened to cut off trade with that country. This followed his attempts throughout his presidency to detach the United States from its traditional alliances, which together has maintained a relative overall world peace since after World War II and the founding of the NATA alliance.

Some members of the Congressional Republican caucus finally discovered their backbones, which they apparently had forgotten when Trump took over the oval office the first time and continuing throughout his current regime of incompetence and danger to our democratic republic.

Referring to Trump’s plan to tax Spain’s players: “I think it’s a rip-off,” Rep. Tim Burchett, R-Tenn., told Fox News Digital.

And on the other side of the aisle: “It’s wrong, and that kind of highlights something bigger,” Rep. Jonathan Jackson, D-Ill., said about the tax rate on Spain’s prize.

Burchett asserted that this tax sends a destructive message ahead of the U.S. hosting more major international sporting events including the 2028 Los Angeles Summer Olympics, and the 2031 Rugby World Cup. Representative Burchell argued that our country should encourage international athletes and visitors to spend money here rather than imposing high taxes.

But there are many connections between Trump’s tax scheme on Spain and his ultimate “big lie” that some sort of “deep state” and foreign intervention cheated him from being declared the winner of the 2020 presidential election.

Because there was no way Trump could have claimed that Spain had cheated in its FIFA win, his enforcement of the high tax rate can be viewed as his virtual claim that the game had been rigged, as he had claimed that his 2020 defeat had been rigged.

In his effort to actually rig the upcoming 2026 midterm elections where polls suggest that Democrats are set to make big gains, Trump and many members of the Republican party have already set in motion their attempts to suppress voting outcomes by blocks expected to vote Democratic.

The Safeguard American Voter Eligibility Act (misnamed “SAVE Act”) is moving through Congress under the National Defense Authorization Act. It requires in-person voting by providing documented proof of U.S. citizenship when registering to vote in federal elections. The Bill either severely curtails or totally eliminates online and mail-in registration.

Though the Bill has passed the House with a simple majority, it has virtually no chance of clearing the Senate because of the lack of support to overcome the 60-vote filibuster threshold. Trump warned that until the Bill clears both houses of Congress, he will not sign any bills supported by a majority in Congress.

The Bill mandates documented proof of U.S. citizenship through either a U.S. passport or a valid birth certificate. It also requires potential voters to present a very narrow set of government-issued IDs when attempting to cast a ballot. In addition, it directs all states to identify and remove all people considered non-citizens from the voting rolls using only federal data such as the Department of Homeland Security’s SAVE database.

An absentee ballot is allowed only to individuals who submit a copy of their identification document with both a request for and the submission of the absentee ballot.

Opponents claim that this is actually a “voter suppression” Bill and that fraudulent voting occurs so rarely that it has never influenced the final results of any election in the 250 years of our democratic experiment. They also assert that the Bill will negatively impact poorer and elder voters who may not have a passport, access to their birth certificate, or available transportation to their in-person registration and voting precincts.

Supporters, such as the President, claim that the Bill will ensure safe and reliable voting results free from fraud and deception. He disputes the charge that it will disenfranchise people who have changed their names from what appears on their birth certificate or even on their passports, for example, anyone who marries and takes the name of their spouse (either by dropping their family name or hyphenating their family name with that of their spouse), changing their name for any reason, and changing their birth name to accord with their gender identity.

This is a blatant attack on our voting rights and access to the ballot box, though it is being framed as election integrity legislation. The truth is that any legislation that would create new barriers to voter registration and add a host of negative impacts on our communities should not be considered.

Working-class voters, Black and Brown communities, LGBTQ+ people (especially trans and non-binary voters), elder adults, adults with disabilities, and people in rural communities are the targets of this bill.

The only one to rig the FIFA games and U.S. elections systems is Donald Trump himself. His arguments are simply his projections of his own evil intentions onto others in his attempt to spare his fragile ego the truth that he is a loser and a con artist, who not-so artfully has been demolishing U.S. institutions, in addition to traditional international alliances.