Virginia Governor: Trump's Rhetoric-Policy Kotori the US Reputation as a Good World Power

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu visits US President Donald Trump's office on July 9, 2025. (X@IsraeliPM)

JAKARTA - The governor of the state of Virginia, Abigail Spanberger, said that the rhetoric and actions of US President Donald Trump have tarnished the reputation of the US as a world power.

"Who benefits from his rhetoric, his policies, his actions, the short list of laws he has pushed through this Republican Congress?" Spanberger said in response to Trump's state of the union address delivered before a joint session of Congress in the House of Representatives Chamber, Washington, Tuesday, February 24, local time.

Spanberger harshly criticized Trump's immigration policy through ICE officers who have "separated families" a lot and damaged the US's global reputation.

Spanberger argues that security and humanity are not mutually exclusive. With the policies that have been implemented, he says the Trump administration's approach has failed in both areas.

He then highlighted Trump's claim that food prices in the US had fallen and mortgage rates were at their lowest level in four years. Spanberger said that in reality, many families in the US still feel depressed by the cost of housing, food, and health care. He emphasized that Trump's economic optimism was different from the daily reality.

Instead of finding a way out of the problems faced by US citizens, according to him, Trump prefers to anger and divide the nation. However, he continued, sometimes Trump's efforts to divide the US community are successful.

He added that President Trump "riches himself, his family, his friends".

"This scale of corruption has never happened before," he said, finally exposing a list of complaints, including "the closure of the Epstein file" and Trump's latest renovations in the country's capital.