From multi-billion dollar arms deals to personal business ventures, Donald Trump’s first term was marked by significant changes in U.S. foreign policy with Saudi Arabia. As his second term begins, doubts and questions about the alliance continue to evolve.
Fayez Hammad, a lecturer at the USC Political Science and International Relations department, spoke with Annenberg Media about the evolution of U.S.-Saudi Arabia relations under President Donald Trump.
“It will perhaps be a reflection of President Trump’s transactional mode of carrying policies, in a similar manner that he did in 2017,” Hammad said about the relationship.
Trump’s first overseas trip during his first term, which took place after Saudi Arabia bought almost $400 billion of goods from the United States, deepened the relationship between the two nations. Almost one month into his second term, on January 25, Trump alluded to this interaction, saying “If Saudi Arabia wanted to buy another $450 billion or $500 billion — we’ll up it for all the inflation —- I think I’d probably go.”
Saudi Arabia and the U.S. have always had strong bilateral ties, preceding both the Trump and Biden administrations. From exporting oil to Europe after World War II to supporting anti-communism in Afghanistan and Nicaragua, Saudi Arabia has been a vital partner to the United States against common adversaries.
Over the years, this developed into a “web of relations in economic, military and diplomatic spheres,” Hammad said. Saudi Arabia has been working on diversifying its investment portfolio, which now includes billions of dollars across areas of technology, oil, and real estate.
Several U.S. presidents have criticized Saudi Arabia for its government’s human rights violations. Saudi journalist Jamal Khashoggi was assassinated in Turkey in 2018. After an investigation, the CIA concluded that his murder and dismemberment were “on behalf of” and “approved by” Saudi Crown Prince Muhammad Bin Salman.
Trump boasted about his role in protecting the Prince in 2020, saying “I saved his ass, I was able to get Congress to leave him alone. I was able to get them to stop.”
The CIA report was released by Joe Biden in 2021, after he pledged to make Saudi Arabia a “pariah” in reference to Khashoggi’s murder.
He later reneged on this promise and decided not to sanction Salman. This decision —- along with several actions taken by the Biden administration — ignore the human rights violations Saudi Arabia’s government has committed.
This was also a significant reversal for Biden, who claimed a commitment to human rights above U.S. strategic interests. “We will make clear that America will never again check its principles at the door just to buy oil or sell weapons”, Biden told the Council of Foreign Relations during the 2020 Presidential election, adding that America needs to hold Saudi accountable and “impose consequences for reckless [actions].”
“The United States instrumentalizes human rights issues to its advantage,” Hammad said. He said the U.S.’s real concern is their strategic interests.
This can be observed as a pattern in U.S. foreign policy, wherein it condemns adversaries for the same acts that are ignored if committed by allies. Referring to the Russian invasion of Ukraine as an example, Hammad said “the Israeli commission of war crimes [in Gaza] and what the International Court of Justice has deemed to be a plausible genocide, and the United States basically changed the topic of discussion.”
“It’s the liberal internationalist administration of Biden,” Hammad said. He also said it is important to “provide a critical assessment to the claim that the United States is concerned about human rights violations.”
Despite this, the relationship between Washington and Riyadh has never been as personal as it became under Mr. Trump’s first presidency, and this may carry on into his second term.
The Middle East has been a growing regional focus for the Trump Organization, a real estate conglomerate owned by Trump and currently managed by his two sons — Donald Trump Jr. and Eric Trump.
Dar Al Arkan, a Saudi Arabia-based real estate development company, has signed various deals with the Trump Organization in Oman, Saudi Arabia, and UAE. Scheduled to be unveiled in 2028, the project in Oman is a joint venture between Dar Global– a subsidiary of Dar Al Arkan– and the Trump Organization, in partnership with Omran Group, Oman’s executive arm for tourism development.
Although most of these deals are not owned by the Trump Organization, they have the right to use the “Trump” name and mark under license, providing the Trump family with tens of millions of dollars in fees in exchange.
In a report by the Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington, Trump racked up approximately 3,400 conflicts of interest in his first term. Furthermore, the ethics plan submitted by the Trump Transition Team does not address how the President himself will handle these conflicts of interest.
“The role of money… is well entrenched in American politics itself, and so one will be naive to express shock when the same is conducted overseas,” Hammad said.
Jared Kushner, Trump’s son-in-law and former senior advisor, formed Affinity Partners in 2021, an investment firm backed by $2 billion from Saudi Arabia’s sovereign public wealth fund.
“The Trump administration with this transactional sense of things, it definitely provides more space for the Saudi state to show its influence and importance to the U.S.,” Hammad said.
On February 18, Saudi Arabia hosted peace talks between Russian officials and United States officials in Riyadh. Hammad believes this indicates how the strong relationship between Trump and Salman is increasing Saudi influence, both domestically and internationally.
Political entities and the people in the region hope that “Saudi Arabia would exercise its important role in ramification in a way that will help bring about a peaceful settlement,” Hammad said.
Trump recently shared his plan for Gaza, proposing the expulsion of Palestinians from the Gaza Strip and acquiring Gaza as a U.S. territory to be developed.
This plan is in direct conflict with the demands of the Saudi Arabian government, as well as the people of Gaza and other Arab states, who advocate for a two-state solution. This solution has been loudly rejected by various leaders in the Middle East and globally. The implications such a plan could have in the region are disastrous and have led to warnings of “ethnic cleansing,” by UN Secretary General António Guterres.
Hammad said this plan will “amount to nothing short of commission of a war crime.”
Trump, who is no stranger to making controversial statements, has made similar comments about claiming independent territories such as acquiring Canada as a 51st state, buying Greenland, and taking over the Panama Canal. Prime Minister Justin Trudeau has reiterated several times that “there isn’t a snowball’s chance in hell that Canada would become part of the United States.” Danish Prime Minister Mette Frederikson has also rejected Trump’s proposal– a stance that has received support from EU nations like Germany and France.
Referring to these comments as “outlandish, 19th-century imperial threats,” Hammad said “one will have to look really deep and hard to find any coherent element of a [negotiating] strategy, and as a result, people chalk it up to this unique aspect of Trump’s conduct of figurative talk…when the United States President says anything, people have to take it seriously.”
Saudi leadership has loudly rejected Trump’s plan for Gaza and said they will not normalize relations with Israel without the creation of a Palestinian state. In 2020, the Abraham Accords were signed between UAE and Bahrain as an attempt to normalize relations between Israel and the Arab States. Sudan and Morocco later joined these agreements. Hammad believes that Saudi Arabia will not sign the Abraham Accords before it sees “significant progress towards achieving a Palestinian state.”