For almost an hour on September 23, 2025, Donald Trump stood at the podium of the UN General Assembly. His speech at the United Nations was, to many, one of the clearest expositions of his worldview and his ideology.
His speech was aimed at his opponents and their ideas, picking them off as he praised himself. He began at home, celebrating the United States and himself. He said the US was living through a golden age and repeated his much-disputed claim that he had personally ended seven wars, a claim that he argued merited a Nobel Peace Prize. He said some countries “are going to hell” over their immigration policies, and he blasted climate change as “the greatest con job ever perpetrated on the world.” Trump’s speech reasserted his populist message, framing the U.S. as exceptional, self-reliant, and victimized by global institutions. His focus on national sovereignty over international cooperation mirrors the “America First” stance that defined his earlier presidency.
Trump, who is campaigning for a Nobel Peace Prize, boasted that he, and not the U.N., has been a key player in settling global conflicts. But Trump’s repeated claims of being a peacemaker are complicated. Some of the conflicts he has cited in the past have not been wars or have not yet ended, including Cambodia and Thailand, Kosovo and Serbia, the Congo and Rwanda, Pakistan and India, Israel and Iran, Egypt and Ethiopia, and Armenia and Azerbaijan. “I ended seven wars, dealt with the leaders of each and every one of these countries, and never even received a phone call from the United Nations offering to help in finalizing the deal,” Trump said. Trump’s remarks reflect his long-standing wariness of multilateral institutions, particularly the United Nations.
He opened his section on migration by stating that “your countries are being ruined”, saying “The United Nations is funding an assault on Western countries and their borders.” Claiming that the UN provides cash assistance towards migrants journeying to the US, Trump then stated: “The UN is supposed to stop invasions, not create them.”
Trump’s views on climate change also grab headlines, denying the global consensus that fossil fuels are contributing to climate change. He continuously undermined the UN’s efforts to address climate change, adding that warnings of severe floods, droughts, heat waves, and other climate-related disasters “were made by stupid people”.
In addition, Trump criticized the UN over what he views as its ineffectiveness. He questioned the organization’s purpose, saying it had potential but was not living up to that. All it did, he claimed, was write strongly worded letters that it did not follow up on. The president blamed the UN for a broken escalator and teleprompter that disrupted his visit and speech. He said he was the victim of a “triple sabotage” at the UN, where an escalator, a teleprompter, and a microphone all failed him. “A REAL DISGRACE took place at the United Nations yesterday — Not one, not two, but three very sinister events!” Trump wrote in a post on Truth Social.
There’s very little to take reassurance from a multilateral perspective when viewing Trump’s 57-minute speech. In his view, the UN is not up to speed with attempts to build peace, it doesn’t function properly, it’s secondary to bilateral efforts, and it has supported an “invasion” by migrants.
In the end, Trump’s address to the United Nations underscored not only his deep skepticism of global cooperation but also his enduring belief that America’s strength—and his own leadership—stand above the world’s institutions.
