Mary Trump Says Allies Have 'No Reason' to Trust Donald Trump's America

Mary Trump, the president's niece and a clinical psychologist, warned that America's allies have no reason to trust the United States again unless the country spends generations rebuilding itself. She called Donald Trump's "betrayal of Ukraine" "obscene."

She made the remarks on The Rest Is Politics: Leading, hosted by Rory Stewart, a former British Conservative cabinet minister, and Alastair Campbell, Tony Blair's former communications director. The interview ran on The Mary Trump Podcast on Thursday. It came days after the president waived most of a new Russia sanctions law and told Ukraine it was "time" to make a deal with Moscow.

"So I hope that our alliances can be repaired. But in America, we can't go back. We need to completely reshape, remake, reimagine who we are as a country," Mary Trump said. "Because right now there is literally no reason I can see that any of our allies would ever trust us again unless we do very hard work in the next couple of generations."

She added that the work would be needed "not just to undo the damage, but to prove that we can be trusted."

Mary Trump on Ukraine, NATO and Vladimir Putin

Asked by Campbell whether her uncle had switched sides or had always backed the Russian president, she answered: "He's been on Putin's side since the 80s, I believe." She offered no evidence for that view. She also dismissed the theory that Vladimir Putin holds compromising material on Trump as beside the point: "I think we're beyond that. Honestly, I think it wouldn't matter."

"Donald has made it clear from the beginning that he's not really interested in protecting Ukraine," she said. "Last week was one of the most despicable things I've ever seen in my life. His betrayal of Ukraine is just obscene."

She did not say what happened "last week." The previous week, on Oct. 16, Trump signed an executive order waiving most Russia-related provisions of the Lindsey O. Graham Sanctioning Russia and Iran Act, two days before they were due to take effect. The waiver covered tariffs on Russian goods, penalties on major buyers of Russian oil and gas, and sanctions on foreign banks. The White House said enforcing them could hinder peace talks. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said the waiver eased pressure on Russia. Senate Democratic leader Chuck Schumer called it "giving the Russian economy life support."

The Alaska summit with Putin, the lifting of sanctions on Russian diesel and Trump's Oval Office clash with Zelenskyy came up in Stewart's question, not in Mary Trump's answers. Her own charge was broader: "Now we are abandoning our democratic ally so Donald can enrich himself with this deal with Russia."

On the alliance itself, she said: "He wants to leave NATO. He wouldn't care if NATO were dismantled." Trump has not withdrawn from NATO. He did press allies for higher spending, and at the 2025 Hague summit they committed to spending 5 percent of GDP on defense by 2035, up from the 2 percent benchmark set in 2014.

On Tuesday, Trump pressed Zelenskyy to settle. "We've given a lot to Ukraine," he said. "We've gotten absolutely nothing back except grief, death, tremendous monetary loss."

Europe Is Paying, and Trust in the U.S. Is Falling

Europe now carries most of the aid burden. The Kiel Institute's Ukraine Support Tracker found that European donors allocated about 11 billion euros in May and June 2026, led by a new EU loan. Germany gave 700 million euros in military aid, Denmark 600 million and the Netherlands 500 million. The United Kingdom gave about 1.5 billion euros in financial and humanitarian aid. Europe still depends on American weapons, though: European donors bought at least 3 billion euros' worth from U.S. defense companies in the first half of the year.

Fewer people abroad now see the U.S. as dependable. A Pew Research Center survey of 36 countries, conducted from February to May 2026, found a median of 37 percent hold a favorable view of the U.S., and only 23 percent express confidence in Trump. In Canada, 35 percent called the U.S. a reliable partner, down from 83 percent in 2022. In South Korea, the figure fell from 83 percent to 57 percent.

At home, Trump's job approval stands at 37.5 percent in PolitiKool's polling average.

'Thousands of Co-Conspirators'

Stewart argued that the problem goes beyond the president, and that Trump has revealed a lasting strain of American thinking. "It makes it very, very difficult for anyone who follows him to rebuild the kind of trust that existed before," he said.

Mary Trump agreed and blamed Republicans who did not restrain her uncle. "So there are thousands of co-conspirators here who need to be held just as accountable as Donald," she said.

She has made similar warnings to allies before. Earlier this week she said that capitulating to her uncle had won them nothing. Trump said Tuesday that he wants Zelenskyy to make a deal and that it is "time."