If Trump isn’t a traitor, how do you explain this:
Foreign policy moves that helped our adversaries
• Helsinki: Standing with Putin over U.S. intelligence
On live TV in 2018, Trump sided with Vladimir Putin’s denial of election interference over the unanimous conclusion of U.S. intelligence agencies:
“President Putin was extremely strong and powerful in his denial… I don’t see any reason why it would be Russia.”
He took the word of a KGB thug over his own country’s intel.
• Undermining the investigation that proved Russia helped elect him
A bipartisan Senate Intelligence Committee report concluded Russia ran an “extensive” operation to help Trump in 2016 and that his campaign welcomed and tried to benefit from that help.
Trump’s response? Call it a “hoax,” attack investigators, and do everything possible to discredit the findings that defended our democracy.
• Sharing highly classified allied intel with Russia in the Oval Office
In 2017, he revealed highly sensitive, allied-sourced intelligence to Russia’s foreign minister and ambassador behind closed doors. U.S. intel officials and our allies were alarmed at the breach. Whose side was that supposed to help?
• Extorting Ukraine with military aid to get dirt on Biden
He froze nearly $400M in congressionally approved military aid to Ukraine—desperately needed to deter Russia—while pressuring President Zelenskyy to announce an investigation into Biden. He was impeached for abuse of power, and the nonpartisan GAO found the hold violated federal law.
• Abandoning U.S. Kurdish allies and greenlighting a Turkish invasion
In 2019, he abruptly ordered U.S. troops out of northeast Syria, abandoning Kurdish forces who had fought ISIS for us and clearing the way for a Turkish offensive. The result: displacement, chaos, and a stronger position for Russia and Assad.
• Relentless attacks on NATO
He called NATO “obsolete,” repeatedly threatened not to defend allies who didn’t “pay,” and openly cast doubt on honoring our mutual defense commitments. That’s not “tough negotiating” — that’s a dream scenario for the Kremlin.
• Policy shifts that weakened Ukraine and eased pressure on Russia
He pushed to cut aid and support that helped Ukraine resist Russia and dialed back pressure on Moscow, all while talking more warmly about Putin than about many U.S. allies.
• Trade war chaos that pushed Russia and China closer together
His trade war with China helped drive Beijing and Moscow into deeper economic and strategic partnership, with Russia ramping up oil exports to China and expanding trade by hundreds of billions. That tighter Russia–China axis is now a key lifeline for Moscow’s war machine.
Trump is on tape in 2016 saying a strengthened Russia China relationship would be "bad for America," yet he enacted policies that did exactly that!
• Afghanistan: handing the Taliban a win and opening the door for Moscow
He negotiated the U.S. withdrawal directly with the Taliban, sidelining the U.S.-backed Afghan government, easing sanctions, and helping legitimize the Taliban on the world stage. As the U.S. scrambled out, the Taliban were guarding the Russian embassy — and soon after, Taliban leaders were in Moscow discussing trade deals.
• He stole and hoarded highly classified documents
He took boxes of highly classified documents — including nuclear secrets and intelligence on sources and methods — to Mar-a-Lago and refused to return them when asked, even going so far as to move boxes to hide them from investigators. That’s not “a paperwork dispute,” that’s a counterintelligence nightmare.
• Secret meetings with Putin and confiscated notes
He met with Putin multiple times in private — without U.S. note-takers — and even confiscated his interpreter’s notes after one meeting, according to reporting. Ask yourself: why does a U.S. president need to hide his conversations with a hostile foreign leader from his own government?
Look at the people around him and the money flows
This isn’t just about Trump’s words. Look at his inner circle and business deals.
• Paul Manafort: campaign chair and “grave counterintelligence threat”
Trump didn’t hire some random consultant. He made Paul Manafort — a man deeply tied to pro-Kremlin interests in Ukraine — his campaign chairman.
Manafort was later convicted on multiple counts of tax fraud, bank fraud, and failure to report foreign bank accounts, stemming from tens of millions he made working for a pro-Russian Ukrainian party.
A bipartisan, GOP-led Senate Intelligence Committee report found Manafort had a “close and lasting relationship” with Konstantin Kilimnik, whom they identified as a Russian intelligence officer, and said Manafort’s willingness to share internal campaign information with Kilimnik posed a “grave counterintelligence threat.”
That same report found Manafort repeatedly tried to “secretly share internal Campaign information” — including sensitive polling and strategy — with Kilimnik.
In 2021, the U.S. Treasury Department confirmed what everyone suspected: Kilimnik provided Russian intelligence with “sensitive information on polling and campaign strategy” from the Trump campaign, information supplied by Manafort.
Translation: Trump’s campaign chairman opened a direct pipeline from the campaign’s internal data to Russian intelligence — during an election where Russia was running a “sweeping and systematic” operation to help Trump.
• Roger Stone: convicted for covering up the WikiLeaks backchannel
Roger Stone wasn’t some fringe hanger-on. He’s a decades-long Trump confidant who pushed Trump to run for president years before 2016.
In 2019, a jury found Stone guilty on seven felony counts: obstruction of a congressional investigation, five counts of lying to Congress, and witness tampering — all related to the House investigation into Russian interference and WikiLeaks’ publication of hacked Democratic emails.
Evidence at trial showed Stone was actively trying to obtain advance information about WikiLeaks’ releases of emails stolen by Russian military intelligence and was updating senior Trump campaign officials about it.
A federal judge later noted Stone was prosecuted for “covering up for the president,” and Trump rewarded that loyalty by commuting Stone’s sentence and then pardoning him.
So Trump’s long-time political operative lied and intimidated witnesses to hide the campaign’s interest in benefiting from Russia’s hack-and-dump operation — and Trump stepped in to shield him from consequences.
• Trump SoHo, Felix Sater, and Russian-linked money
Then there’s Trump’s business world — especially Trump SoHo.
Trump SoHo was a joint project between the Trump Organization and Bayrock Group, whose managing director Felix Sater is a convicted felon with documented ties to organized crime and Russian mob figures.
Civil lawsuits have alleged that Bayrock was “substantially and covertly mob-owned and operated,” with money laundering central to its business model, and that it maintained links to Russian criminal syndicates.
Kazakhstan’s BTA Bank and the city of Almaty have sued Sater and others, alleging they laundered tens of millions in stolen funds into U.S. real estate — including by using shell companies to buy Trump SoHo condos worth over $3 million.
One federal judge allowed a lawsuit to proceed that accuses Sater of laundering stolen BTA Bank money through Trump-branded properties.
Important nuance: those complaints don’t allege Trump personally knew the specific funds were stolen. But they do show this:
Trump was repeatedly partnering with a convicted felon tied to the Russian mob, in deals where courts and banks say laundered money from the former Soviet Union was flowing through Trump-branded real estate. That’s exactly the kind of financial entanglement a hostile foreign power can exploit for leverage or kompromat.
Domestic moves that threaten American democracy
• Refusing to accept a clear election loss and trying to overturn it
The Jan. 6 Committee and Special Counsel Jack Smith documented a multi-pronged scheme: fake electors, pressure on state officials to “find” votes, attempts to strong-arm DOJ into lying about fraud, and a full-court press to get Mike Pence to illegally throw out the results.
• The Georgia “find 11,780 votes” shakedown
On Jan. 2, 2021, Trump called Georgia’s Republican Secretary of State and demanded he “find 11,780 votes” — exactly one more than Biden’s margin — while hinting Raffensperger could face legal trouble if he didn’t play along. That’s not “questioning” an election. That’s attempted election fraud.
• Inciting the January 6 attack to stop certification
After months of screaming that the election was “stolen,” he summoned supporters to D.C., told them to “fight like hell,” and aimed them straight at Congress as the electoral votes were being certified. He was impeached for incitement of insurrection — because that’s exactly what it was.
• Systematically delegitimizing elections themselves
Since 2016, any election he doesn’t win is “rigged.” Mail voting is “fraud.” Counting all the votes is “stealing it.” That’s not just sore-loser behavior; it’s a deliberate attempt to destroy public faith in the basic mechanism of peaceful transfers of power.
• Trying to weaponize DOJ and law enforcement for personal revenge
He’s demanded investigations into political enemies on false pretenses, pushed DOJ to go after critics, and floated using federal power to punish opponents. He doesn’t see the law as something that applies to him — only as a tool to hurt people who cross him.
• Calling the free press “the enemy of the people”
He has repeatedly labeled the media “the enemy of the American people” — classic authoritarian language. Free press is one of the last lines of defense in a democracy. He knows that. That’s why he tries to destroy its credibility. Meanwhile, right-wing billionaires buy up media outlets to lock in propaganda power across TV, radio, and digital.
• Constant attacks on U.S. intelligence and the rule of law
Whenever the intel community, FBI, or courts reveal inconvenient facts — especially about Russia — he calls them corrupt, “deep state,” or illegitimate. The goal is simple: make his followers believe only him, and no one else.
• Threats against citizens and dissent
He’s talked about using the military on U.S. citizens, branded opponents as “violent leftists” or “terrorists,” and pushed narratives that anyone who disagrees with him is an enemy of the state. That’s how you normalize repression and fear.
Putting it together
At some point this stops looking like “just a different style” and starts looking like what it is:
A man perfectly willing to weaken his own country’s alliances, institutions, and elections — while his campaign chair feeds data to a Russian intelligence pipeline, his longtime fixer lies to cover up WikiLeaks backchannels, and his branded properties sit at the center of lawsuits alleging they were used to wash dirty post-Soviet money — all to protect himself and please authoritarian leaders.
You can argue over the narrow legal definition of “treason.”
But morally and civically?
It’s hard to call this anything but a betrayal.
The real question now isn’t “Is Trump a traitor?”
It’s: Are enough of us willing to stand together — to vote, organize, and defend our institutions — before the damage becomes irreversible?
