Nassau's Pete King slams Trump amid primaries

Daily Point

Former GOP rep: 'America First should not be America Alone!'

At a moment when Long Island's midterm congressional choices are coming into sharper public focus, former Rep. Pete King has posted a scathing review of President Donald Trump's approach to foreign affairs and alliances.

"At a time of increasing threats to world peace and security, the agreement which the Trump Administration has signed with Iran has raised questions about America's reliability as an ally and our role as leader of the free world," King declared Saturday on social media.

King concludes with the sentence: "President Trump's words of affection toward dictators Putin and Xi and his gratuitous insults toward Ukraine's Zelensky, Israel's Netanyahu and Italy's Meloni serve no good purpose. America First should not be America Alone!"

Other voters here and across the United States who support or at least respect the current leadership in Israel, Ukraine and Italy might find Trump's verbal broadsides and strategy in Iran discouraging, as King clearly sees. Until now, the House GOP majority has chosen to stay in lockstep with the White House on its still-unresolved Iran war.

Opinions expressed by King, 82, still hold relevance in Nassau County Republican circles. He's one of the vice chairs of the county GOP committee under chairman Joe Cairo and County Executive Bruce Blakeman's office has awarded King consulting contracts stemming from his role as a "confidential adviser on counterterrorism and homeland security."

In Long Island's four congressional districts, GOP candidates are attempting to unseat centrist Democratic Reps. Tom Suozzi and Laura Gillen while Republican Reps. Nick LaLota and Andrew Garbarino are clearly taking Democratic challenges against them seriously. Mike LiPetri, who is Cairo's preferred candidate against Suozzi, faces a GOP primary challenge, concluding Tuesday, from lawyer Greg Hach, who is running to LiPetri's right.

The rest of King's statement elaborates on Trump's foreign policy weaknesses.

"For eighty years American leadership of NATO deterred Soviet aggression, brought down the Iron Curtain and prevented the outbreak of wars which had caused hundreds of thousands of American combat deaths in two World Wars in the previous 30 years. Despite tension and friction with various leaders (including Reagan and Thatcher) American Presidents asserted leadership and maintained unity.

"Rather than working to keep that unity, President Trump has threatened to seize Greenland, make Canada our 51st State and abdicated to Europe leadership of defending Ukraine against Russian aggression. (By not involving Europe in the planning of the war with Iran, we lost the opportunity of using their minesweepers to clear the Strait of Hormuz.) Similarly, in Asia our failure to complete arms sales to Taiwan is viewed by democratic allies such as Japan and the Philippines as appeasement of Communist China."

King doubled down in a second weekend post, writing, "America First cannot be America Alone," criticizing Trump for insulting allies and echoing that the results of the Iran war "are disappointing."

In recent days, Iran again closed off the Strait of Hormuz, threatening havoc on the world economy, after Israel launched new attacks aimed at Iran-allied Hezbollah, which operates out of Lebanon.

Trump, in a phone call earlier this month, demanded an explanation and reportedly told Netanyahu, "You'd be in prison if it weren't for me," according to Axios.

Trump has criticized Israeli military strikes that targeted and destroyed entire apartment buildings in Beirut, saying not everyone in those residences is part of Hezbollah.

On Sunday on Facebook, King's tone changed slightly, still reminding Vice President JD Vance to "stand strong against Iran," but adding a nod to Trump at the end of his post. "To quote President Trump," King wrote, "we hold the cards!"

— Dan Janison dan.janison@newsday.com

Pencil Point

Strait to the bank

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Quick Points

This LIer's so good he could have predicted prediction markets

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— Mark Nolan mark.nolan@newsday.com

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