For four years, the world has watched with surprise, horror and in some places glee as President Trump battered one democratic norm after another, exposing the so-called leader of the free world as just another troubled and deeply divided nation.
Still, the planet was little prepared for the stunning scenes Wednesday, when a pro-Trump mob, some flying Confederate flags, stormed the U.S. Capitol to disrupt a congressional vote certifying President-elect Joe Biden’s electoral victory.
“That rhetoric of American exceptionalism has lost a lot of shine in recent years, but nobody expected this to happen,” said Carlos Bravo Regidor, a political analyst and a professor at CIDE, a public research center in Mexico City.
“This is a reckoning or a coming to terms with the fact that the U.S. can no longer be seen as a beacon of hope and democracy.”
Around the world, the insurrection in Washington — stoked by Trump and loyalist Republican lawmakers who have refused to accept his defeat in the November election — served as an ugly coda to a presidency that abandoned democratic allies, embraced autocrats and failed to respond to grave threats to domestic institutions, including the COVID-19 pandemic and Russian hacking.
Even as Congress reconvened Wednesday evening to certify Biden’s win, the turmoil prompted despair among the world’s democratic leaders and pleas for a peaceful transfer of power, and underscored the immense challenges facing the president-elect as he seeks to repair America’s international standing.
“This was an act of violence against the heart of democracy,” Julian Reichelt, the editor in chief of Bild newspaper, Germany’s best-selling tabloid, said in a TV interview. “This hurts everyone who has America in their hearts.”
Biden, in a televised speech, invoked the message that the violent scenes conveyed about the health of the American system.
“The world is watching,” Biden said. “Think of what the rest of the world is looking at.”
The view from afar was one of alarm and sadness. Social media feeds read like a eulogy for the American ideal.
“Our thoughts are with the American people,” wrote Nanaia Mahuta, New Zealand’s foreign affairs minister.
“Disgraceful scenes,” British Prime Minister Boris Johnson said.
“In the eyes of the world, American democracy tonight appears under siege,” wrote Josep Borrell Fontelles, the European Union’s high representative for foreign affairs. “This is an unseen assault on US democracy, its institutions and the rule of law. This is not America.”
“Enemies of democracy are celebrating these unbelievable images,” tweeted German Foreign Minister Heiko Maas, who called on Trump and his supporters to “finally accept…
Read More: World reacts to D.C. violence: ‘This is not America’