Donald Trump humiliated himself Wednesday in front of several leaders of African states by revealing just how little he knows about their countries.

During a meeting with leaders from Gabon, Guinea-Bissau, Liberia, Mauritania, and Senegal, as part of a multiday summit to discuss “commercial opportunities,” Trump attempted to pay a compliment to Liberian President Joseph Boakai—but fell completely flat.

“Such good English, such beautiful—where did you learn to speak so beautifully?” Trump asked. “Where were you educated? Where? In Liberia?”

“Yes, sir,” Boakai answered.

“Well, that’s very interesting. It’s beautiful English. I have people at this table [that] can’t speak nearly as well,” Trump said.

Trump to the President of Liberia: "Such good English. Where did you learn to speak so beautifully?" English is the official language of Liberia...

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It would clearly surprise Trump to learn that English is the official language of Liberia.

Trump’s condescending compliment reveals only his own ignorance—but one can hardly be surprised. There are some of us who still remember his “shithole countries” comment.

Liberia has already been severely affected by Trump’s dissolution of the U.S. Agency for Internal Development. Liberia previously received an average of $527.6 million in aid annually between 2014 and 2023. Most of that went toward funding 48 percent of Liberia’s fragile health care system. In 2025, the small West African nation was intended to receive $443 million, but it has now seen $290 million of that funding cut.

Additionally, two weeks ago, Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy announced that the U.S. would no longer fund a global vaccine program called GAVI, which supplies vaccines to poor children around the world.

In a statement Monday, Liberia said the “high-level Summit aims to deepen diplomatic ties, advance shared economic goals, and enhance security cooperation between the United States and select African nations.” Now the country may be considering accepting immigrants as part of Trump’s massive deportation scheme.

Senegalese President Bassirou Diomaye Faye used a tried and true method to curry favor with President Donald Trump: shameless flattery.

“I know you are a tremendous golf player. Golf requires concentration and precision—qualities that also make for a great leader,” Faye said during Trump’s meeting of African leaders on Wednesday. “Senegal has exceptional opportunities to offer, including in the area of tourism. So, perhaps an investment could be made in a golf course in Senegal. It would just be six hours by flight from New York, from Miami, from Europe, or from the Gulf, and that would be an opportunity for you to show off your skills on the golf course too.”

Senegal President: I know you are a tremendous golf player. Golf requires concentration and precision, qualities that also make for a great leader. So, perhaps an investment could be made in a golf course in Senegal.. that would be an opportunity for you to show off your skills… pic.twitter.com/FQ80ndwf6z

Trump seemed tickled.

“Nice, that’s some way to show off my skills. It’s a long trip to show off my skill. But that’s really nice. And he’s led a very interesting life,” Trump said, responding to Faye. “He looks like a very young person; he’s a little older than he looks. But a fantastic job. He was treated very unfairly by his government, and he prevailed, so congratulations on that.”

Faye, who went from political prisoner in 2023 to the first opposition candidate to win the presidency since 1960, made comments reminiscent of the “luxury jet” that the Qatari government so graciously gifted to Trump (although in that case, Trump asked for the jet first). It’s alarming that the sitting president is susceptible to even the most basic levels of flattery—and that foreign leaders everywhere can tell.

At least one person in the Trump administration stands to make a fortune at the National Weather Service’s deathbed.

Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick oversees the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration and its subsidiary, the National Weather Service. But until recently, he also ran a financial firm, Cantor Fitzgerald (which he placed under the stewardship of his two twentysomething sons), that invests in companies vying to replace the weather agencies’ labor.

Cantor owns a controlling interest in BGC Group, which created a weather derivatives desk in 2023 to analyze its clients’ climate-related financial exposure. Cantor is also invested in a satellite company that photographs natural disasters and weather events in real time. Lutnick is especially close to that project—he helped the company go public in 2022.

Lutnick’s most recent ethics filing revealed that he is still in the process of selling off his shares in the company. Securities and Exchange Commission filings obtained by the Associated Press indicate that Lutnick’s stakes aren’t going far—instead, he’s been transferring them to one of his sons.

Lutnick isn’t the only one with outside interests in nixing the agency. Donald Trump’s pick to run NOAA, Neil Jacobs, has been an enthusiastic advocate for privatizing the department’s work. He was previously employed by Panasonic Weather Solutions, one such company collecting weather data. And Trump’s nominee for another NOAA post, Taylor Jordan, is a K-Street lobbyist “with a roster of weather-related clients,” according to the Associated Press.

Trump has been attacking the country’s public weather-monitoring systems since he was on the campaign trail, promising to dismantle NOAA since Hurricane Helene devastated the South.

In February, then-DOGE chief Elon Musk sized down NOAA’s Office of Space Commerce, which is responsible for imposing regulations on two of Musk’s largest assets: SpaceX and Starlink. Musk laid off a third of the office’s staff.

Two months later, the administration proposed formal plans to eviscerate the rest of NOAA’s budget. In internal documents obtained by CNN, the White House claimed that the agency’s myriad weather-related programs were “misaligned with the … expressed will of the American people.”

Nixing NOAA was the brainchild of Project 2025. On page 664, the Christian nationalist manifesto argued that the agency “should be dismantled and many of its functions eliminated, sent to other agencies, privatized, or placed under the control of states and territories.”

But losing NOAA and its federally funded research would have immediate ramifications for the average American. It would effectively

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