Much of the world treats Trump as a shadow president

When Finland wanted to join NATO to ward off Russian aggression, it knew it had a friend living in the White House and could count on U.S. President Joe Biden’s support. But to ensure that the U.S. Senate would ratify its membership bid, Finland’s government decided to also seek out the president living in Florida.

And so Mikko Hautala, the Finnish ambassador to the United States at the time, made a point of speaking privately with former U.S. President Donald Trump to persuade him of the merits of his country joining the alliance. The goal was to head off any opposition by Trump, who has long been openly hostile toward NATO.

The strategy worked. Trump, who potentially could have ignited Republican opposition with a single intemperate social media post, remained publicly silent, and the Senate voted 95-1 to approve Finland’s admission to the alliance in August 2022. Had Trump spoken out against the move, it would have taken only 34 votes to block the two-thirds supermajority needed for ratification.