Trump seeks to rekindle bromance with Kim Jong Un
The Hill · C · trust 61/100
Comments: by Mallory Wilson - 08/21/26 6:00 AM ET Comments: Link copied by Mallory Wilson - 08/21/26 6:00 AM ET Comments: Link copied NOW PLAYING President Trump is pushing to rekindle his first-term bromance with North Korea’s Kim Jong Un, expressing his desire for another rendezvous after reducing joint military exercises with South Korea in an effort to appease the dictator.
The president met with Kim three times during his first term, but ultimately, denuclearization talks stalled and the relationship was left at an impasse. Kim has shown no interest in diplomacy under the Biden administration or during Trump 2.0. His sister, a top adviser, shrugged off Trump’s overtures this week.
Experts warn that more meetings with Kim could be both fruitless and destructive to its crucial alliance with South Korea.
“It’s pretty clear from the first term that he views America’s relationship with South Korea as a complicating factor in his ability to negotiate directly with Kim,” Michael Sobolik, a senior fellow at the Hudson Institute, said of Trump. “The main question I’m asking right now is: What’s Kim’s price going to be for face-to-face meetings with Trump?”
Sobolik noted that in Trump’s first term, scaling down military exercises with South Korea did eventually lead to a meeting with Kim, but it’s doubtful that that’s going to be enough to get Kim to the table this time.
Trump told reporters Wednesday that he plans to meet with Kim later this year but didn’t give any more details on when or where it could take place.
“The fact that I get along with him — that’s a good thing, not a bad thing,” Trump said of Kim. “He has 57 very powerful nuclear weapons. Should have never allowed it to happen. If I was president, I wouldn’t have allowed it to happen. But he’s got them.”
The Wall Street Journal reported that Trump has privately discussed setting up an in-person chat with Kim during his next trip to Asia, which is likely in November when he attends the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation in China.
Andrew Yeo, SK-Korea Foundation chair at the Brookings Institution, said Chinese leader Xi Jinping could help set up the meeting if Kim views it as valuable.
“Although some believe Kim has no need or interest in reengaging the U.S. given its close ties to Russia and China, Washington still holds things Pyongyang values, including political normalization, reduction of the U.S. military threat, changes to USFK [U.S. Forces Korea] force posture and ultimately a different relationship with the United States that can more likely happen under Trump than any future U.S. leader,” Yeo said.
“Even if Kim is unable to secure formal U.S. recognition of North Korea as a nuclear weapons state, simply meeting with Trump with denuclearization off the agenda, or with Trump tacitly acknowledging North Korea’s nuclear weapons as a reality, would be a win for Pyongyang,” he added.
At this point, he said a nuclear freeze or some sort of risk-reduction agreement seems more likely to come from a meeting than complete denuclearization.
“I remain skeptical that a leader-level meeting itself would produce firm commitments — Kim could meet Trump and still continue expanding his arsenal afterward, so the real test is whether a summit generates a sustained negotiating process with concrete, verifiable constraint,” he said.
Trump announced on Sunday that he was ordering the Pentagon to reduce the U.S.’s participation in joint military exercises that were set to begin on Monday and last through Aug. 27. He said the exercises came across as unnecessarily hostile toward North Korea and that they were expensive. He also blasted South Korea for declining to help the U.S. assert control over the Strait of Hormuz.
In a Truth Social post announcing the reduction, he again touted his “very good relationship” with Kim.
Seoul, in a statement to Reuters , said it “hopes that the friendly relationship between the U.S. and North Korean leaders will lead to meaningful dialogue between the two countries, opening discussions aimed at advancing peace and stability on the Korean Peninsula.”
South Korean President Lee Jae Myung has also signaled that he hopes for talks with North Korea to work toward ending the decades-long conflict, resulting from a brutal civil war that never technically ended.
“President Lee will encourage Trump to meet with Kim in hopes that improved U.S.-North Korea relations might also pave the way for inter-Korea peace,” Yeo said. “But there’s also the risk for South Korea that Trump sidelines its ally and only looks after U.S. interests in his negotiations with Kim.”
Sobolik, too, said that while there may not be political blowback right now over the reduced exercises, “beyond this current administration in Seoul, this is going to bring up some long-standing questions about American credibility and reliability.”
A senior administration official reiterated the president’s public frustrations with South Korea, which hosts nearly 30,000 U.S. troops on its soil. The U.S. spends upward of $5 billion a year on military bases and troops in the country, while South Korea chips in about $1 billion.
South Korea spends some 2.6 percent of its gross domestic product (GDP) on defense, a relatively high level compared to other countries, but Trump has suggested it should be footing more of the bill for America’s protection.
“President Trump has been clear since his first term that it is imperative that all our allies spend more on capabilities that contribute to the President’s Peace through Strength agenda,” the senior administration official said.
Trump met with Kim once in 2018 and twice in 2019. Sobolik said Trump faces “more…
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