Letters to the Editor: Trump, who stiffed his own workers, is threatening 'delinquent' NATO states?

Then-President Trump looks on as NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg speaks in 2019. ((Evan Vucci / Associated Press))

To the editor: Donald Trump has finally done it — he’s found a way to weaken America without even being president. (“How Trump urging Russia to invade ‘delinquent’ NATO members distorts how the alliance works,” Feb. 12)

If I am a foreign leader, my rule-zero responsibility is to protect my people. In a world of shifting alliances and superpowers, I have to make the best deals I can.

By inviting Russia to attack “delinquent” members of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization, the former president has said in no uncertain terms that the Americans cannot be trusted. Our word means nothing. If Gondor calls for aid, we will send a bill.

America’s power and prestige around the world are based on trust and honor as much as it is on brute force. If you weaken one, you have undermined the whole thing.

Peter Scofield, Corona del Mar

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To the editor: Will the United States ever be forgiven for unleashing Trump on the world?

Trump tells NATO members that he would not protect them from Russian President Vladimir Putin’s aggression if they don’t pay their dues. This is rich, coming from a man who has notoriously stiffed workers on his construction projects.

The only way to put this criminally indicted and morally corrupt genie back in the bottle is to soundly defeat him and his Republican sycophants at the polls in November.

Then, maybe, we can forgive ourselves.

Donna Sloan, Los Angeles

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To the editor: The GOP has become the party of communist sympathizers.

If former President Ronald Reagan were alive today, he’d be horrified by the words and actions of today’s Republicans in Congress and their leader, former President Trump.

While president, Trump used his bully pulpit to declare NATO weak and obsolete. This certainly gave Putin encouragement to attempt to reestablish the Soviet Union. Putin expected no pushback from a sympathetic American president and a divided Europe.

Trump gave effusive praise of Putin, China’s Xi Jinping, Turkey’s Recep Tayyip Erdogan, Hungary’s Viktor Orbán and, of course, North Korea’s Kim Jong Un. Republicans in Congress, with Trump’s encouragement, have held up critically needed aid to Ukraine in its heroic fight against superior Russian forces.

America continues to be the leader of the free world. Republicans are playing party politics when the world requires American decision makers to be statesmen rather than shortsighted vote getters of the far right.

Anthony Elia, Mission Viejo

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To the editor: Reports on Trump’s remarks regarding NATO countries paying their share should include the fact that he and his company were regularly sued by those doing work on their properties in New York for not paying their bills.

It’s just one of the reasons New Yorkers — and others — distrust this man who wants to impose his financial know-how on the world.

Helen Lotos, Corona del Mar

This story originally appeared in Los Angeles Times.