This July, five African leaders gathered at the White House for what was billed as a working lunch with the U.S. President Donald Trump. On the surface, this diplomatic lunch appeared to be a gesture of friendship, but behind the carefully staged photos and polite exchanges, the event was a masterclass in transactional diplomacy. The lunch wasn’t about solidarity, it was about strategy.
The leaders of Liberia, Gabon, Senegal, Mauritania, and Guinea-Bissau were invited. Missing from the list were Nigeria and South Africa: Africa’s economic and diplomatic heavyweights. Their absence wasn’t an oversight; it was a signal. Trump didn’t want Africa’s “big boys,” he wanted resource-rich nations with little geopolitical leverage, ripe for bilateral deals that align with his uncompromising “America First” agenda.
Donald Trump’s foreign policy is often dismissed as unconventional or brash, but it has proven brutally effective in realigning global relationships on his terms. He has recalibrated U.S. diplomacy away from multilateral alliances and toward zero-sum negotiations, where only American interests matter. In doing so, he becomes the first US President since World War Two to challenge the “leader of the free world” role that his country set for itself many decades ago; what he seems to desire is a world where the major powers, unconstrained by internationally agreed laws and diplomatic obligations, are free to impose their will on smaller, weaker nations.
His “trade, not aid” approach to Africa follows this logic. No more string-attached aid, no more high-minded development goals. The new approach is simple: What can you offer the U.S., and what can the U.S. take (and take) in return?
Since returning to the White House, Trump has slashed development assistance across Africa, with the effect that programs which once symbolized goodwill between the U.S. and Africa have been gutted. Liberia — long seen as one of America’s closest African allies — suffered the world’s deepest aid cut relative to its GDP, while other countries saw U.S. funding rerouted or potentially replaced by investment from other countries such as China and Russia, further fueling Trump’s urgency to reassert economic influence.
His approach towards achieving this involves cashing in on the leverage that his “America First” policy has built over the years, now targeting smaller, resource-rich African nations that are desperate for investment, security, or diplomatic recognition; and he does this with the full force of U.S. political and economic power behind him.
The rationale for the leaders of these five countries being specifically invited to the White House lies with minerals, coastlines, and access. Gabon holds nearly a quarter of the world’s manganese reserves, used in steel and battery production. China already gets 22% of its manganese from Gabon and has invested heavily in the country’s infrastructure and health sectors. In response, the U.S. is reasserting its presence — not with aid, but with deals.
Guinea-Bissau boasts untapped deposits of gold, diamonds, bauxite, and phosphate, and is currently being courted by both China and Russia. Liberia’s recent mineral discoveries have triggered a wave of investment from Beijing. Mauritania offers vast potential in green energy and has successfully tackled regional terrorism, making it a strategic partner for Western nations. Senegal, stable and mineral-rich, is rapidly becoming a hotspot for phosphate, zircon, and titanium — materials essential to the global energy transition.
In each case, Trump is deploying a tactic of subtle pressure. He cuts aid, offers access, promises trade, dangles security cooperation and then seals the deal: a carrot-and-stick strategy dressed up as diplomatic charm.
The structure of the lunch said it all. Unlike Trump’s face-offs with European or Canadian leaders where discussions, however tense, were held among equals, this lunch placed African leaders on one side of the table, with Trump and his advisors seated on the opposite side. There was no robust exchange of ideas, no serious debate. Just brief remarks, a few nods toward possible tariff exemptions, and a photo op.
Even the few moments of levity felt awkwardly patronizing. Trump complimented Liberia’s president on his English-speaking ability, apparently unaware or unconcerned with the fact that English is Liberia’s official language. Senegal’s president invited him to come play golf — an offer Trump quickly brushed aside. The tone was clear: America sets the terms, and Africa responds.
Interactions like these may seem trivial, but they reflect a deeper, long-standing dynamic; one in which African deference is met not with benevolence but with exploitation.
The U.S. is currently attempting to dictate South Africa’s highly sensitive domestic politics, notwithstanding the country’s countless efforts to deter their interference. The Nigerian government turns a blind eye to multinationals growing wealthy at the cost of local communities suffering deadly pollution in the face of climate realities. Across southern Africa, workers in Chinese-owned mines report dangerous conditions and widespread labor abuses while their governments look away. These are not isolated issues, they are part of a pattern in which African leaders, faced with the allure of aid and investment, too often trade away sovereignty and sustainability for short-term gains.
Africa’s diplomatic posture, deeply rooted in its colonial legacy and the psychology of conquest, persists even as foreign interests become increasingly transactional. This enduring pattern of quiet concession was on full display during the recent White House lunch, where the gestures of African leaders demonstrated a willingness to appease rather than assert. Several of them expressed unsolicited support for Trump’s rumored Nobel Peace Prize nomination. Mauritania’s president said his country would “never be opposed.” Guinea-Bissau’s leader said, “Of course we are” in support. Gabon’s president called it “a deserved prize.” Trump, of course, was delighted. “I didn’t know I’d be treated this nicely,” he responded, “We could do this all day long.”
Perhaps the clearest example of Trump’s Africa policy is the recent “peace deal” he brokered between Rwanda and the Democratic Republic of Congo. Heralded as a diplomatic victory, the deal is visibly tied to U.S. mineral access. The agreement binds both countries to creating formalized mineral supply chains overseen by a joint committee that includes the U.S., Qatar, and the African Union while security guarantees from the U.S. remain vague. It is clear that what matters to the Trump administration in this case is continued access, not peace in the region.
This is not the “humanitarianism” we have come to associate with the global giant; rather, it is extraction under the banner of stability. African nations are offered peace, but only if they hand over the keys to their mineral wealth. And in this new global order — where China and Russia are aggressively expanding their influence —Trump is offering African leaders a simple deal: side with us, or be left behind.
Trump’s engagement with African nations is also marked by a troubling pattern of ignorance and disdain. His history of racially charged remarks is well documented, from his infamous 2018 description of African countries as “shitholes,” to more recent incidents that reflect both disrespect and deep unfamiliarity. In a high-level meeting with Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni, Trump casually lumped the Democratic Republic of Congo into a list of nations supposedly “sending criminals” to the U.S., saying, “Many, many people come from the Congo. I don’t know what that is.” His tone was not only dismissive but revealing; suggesting a lack of basic knowledge about one of Africa’s largest and most strategically important nations. He has also interfered in South Africa’s domestic politics, dressing down President Cyril Ramaphosa behind closed doors and enacting administrative restrictions tantamount to economic sanctions. In these encounters, Trump doesn’t just ignore diplomatic protocol, he undermines the dignity of African nations entirely.
In this light, the most dangerous miscalculation African leaders can make is to interpret Trump’s sudden attention as goodwill. It is not. What it is, is a move to reassert U.S. dominance in a region where American influence is increasingly waning. Under such circumstances, flattery and hollow praise will not get Africa very far.
The way forward for African leaders is not to reject U.S. engagement entirely or embrace it without suspicion, but to negotiate from a position of strength. Gabon’s President Brice Nguema said it well: “You are welcome to come and invest, otherwise other countries might come instead of you.” This is the kind of language that should underline African engagement with Western countries going forward: strategic, assertive, and aware of bargaining value.
Africa has leverage. Its minerals power the global economy. Its coastlines control critical shipping routes. Its political alignment could shape the next generation of global alliances — and both China and Russia know it. The U.S. does too. Trump’s move isn’t about helping African nations grow; it’s about ensuring America doesn’t lose ground in a global resource race or lose a new frontier in its economic war against China and Russia. Now is not the time for servitude or symbolic lunches, it is time for bargaining.
African leaders must not mistake the setting of a lunch table for a seat at the table of power. They must also understand that the U.S. needs them as much as they need the U.S. The age of colonial deference should be long gone, and now Africa must negotiate, not grovel.
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