Lee Min-hyung joined The Korea Times in 2014 and has worked as a journalist mainly in Korea’s finance, tech and automotive industry. He specializes in content creation, breaking news and in-depth analysis currently on transportation and mobility. You can reach him via mhlee@koreatimes.co.kr.
Trump under fire for linking NK to domestic politics
Political risks high as second NK-US
summit approaches
By Lee Min-hyung
U.S. President Donald Trump
By Lee Min-hyung
U.S. President Donald Trump is facing domestic criticism that he is using the upcoming summit with North Korean leader Kim Jong-un to tackle the political crisis surrounding his plan to build a U.S.-Mexico border wall, according to U.S. experts and politicians.
Starting from his party's defeat in mid-term elections in early November, Trump has experienced more and more political setbacks in the domestic arena.
The latest conflict between Trump and the Democratic Party came last week when he declared a national emergency to fund his plan to build the wall.
Democrats and some Republicans, however, are expressing serious concerns over this and stepping up their criticism of the president.
According to U.S. media, Trump is seeking to change the atmosphere in domestic political circles by “making as much noise as possible” over the two-day summit with Kim.
“Even some harsh critics of Trump's foreign policy hold open the possibility that the president might find it easier to deal with the diminutive Asian tyrant than with House Speaker Nancy Pelosi,” Politico reported Sunday (local time).
The view comes in line with the ongoing political problems Trump faces in the U.S. Beginning with his last talks with Kim, Trump has praised himself for bringing the North forward for dialogue, underlining that no other U.S. politicians have ever been able to hold a summit with any North Korean leader.
With Kim expressing his willingness to denuclearize his nation and bring peace to the Korean Peninsula early last year, Washington-Pyongyang relations started on an unprecedented path toward dialogue, with Trump and Kim holding their historic Singapore summit last June.
Even if no specific and outstanding agreements were made during the landmark meeting, Trump spoke highly of its outcome, and has since stressed his close relationship with the young leader of the North.
To continue gaining political advantage with the upcoming “peace talks” with Kim, Trump is crediting himself for the planned second summit.
“I hope we have the same good luck as we had in the first summit,” Trump told reporters at the White House, Friday. “A lot was done in the first summit. No more rockets going up. No more missiles going up. No more testing of nuclear (weapons). Got back our remains, the remains of our great heroes from the Korean War. We got back our hostages.”
Trump went on to say that the second Washington-Pyongyang summit will be a “very successful one.”
Some U.S. experts, however, argue that Trump needs more specific results during his second meeting with Kim.
“If he has another summit with Kim Jong-un that does not really lead to something more serious than what we have seen so far, having had the debacle of the negotiation with the Congress, it starts to chip away at his mantra that 'I alone can fix it' and 'I'm the greatest deal-maker of all time,” Politico quoted Eric Edelman, a former Pentagon official under ex-U.S. President George W. Bush, as saying.