Sebastian Gorka discussed President-elect Donald Trump’s foreign policy outlook in an interview with Epoch TV’s ‘American Thought Leaders.’
Those seeking to classify President-elect Donald Trump’s foreign policy as either interventionist or isolationist are wrong, according to one of his key policy advisers, Sebastian Gorka.
Gorka, who served as a deputy assistant to the president during Trump’s first term, will reprise that role in the second Trump administration. Joining Epoch TV’s “American Thought Leaders” on Dec. 17, Gorka shared insights into Trump’s foreign policy and national security plans.
Trump’s range of actions during his first term, combined with his rhetoric on the campaign trail and the mix of people he has chosen for positions in his new administration, have led many to speculate about just how he intends to steer U.S. foreign policy.
Regarding the ongoing Russia–Ukraine war, Trump has stressed a desire for negotiations to end the fighting, but has said less about continuing U.S. support for Ukrainian forces as the war stretches on. At other times, Trump has criticized members of NATO for not contributing more funding to the collective military alliance. This month, as Syrian leader Bashar al-Assad lost his hold on power, the president-elect urged the United States to let the situation play out on its own.
Some of Trump’s fellow Republicans, including Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.), have urged against an isolationist approach. In a Dec. 16 op-ed in Foreign Affairs, McConnell praised Trump for his first-term decision to begin sending weapons to Ukraine and for ordering U.S. air strikes on Russian mercenary forces operating in Syria during the 2018 Battle of Khasham. However, McConnell wrote that Trump “sometimes undermined these tough policies through his words and deeds.”
Asked for his thoughts on Trump’s foreign policy rhetoric and his recent call for the United States to stay out of the post-Assad power vacuum, Gorka said Trump has taken a deliberate foreign policy approach that eschews both isolationism and interventionism, instead favoring an approach Gorka has termed “surgical strength.”
“He doesn’t talk about red lines—he takes action,” Gorka said.
He said the Battle of Khasham was exemplary of the foreign policy approach.
