‘The world’s on fire’: Idaho’s Jim Risch says U.S. foreign policy should be guided by America’s interests, but ‘isolationism doesn’t work’

WASHINGTON – When President-elect Donald Trump takes the helm of the U.S. government in January, he’ll face a more complex world than he did at the start of his first term, but he’ll also have an ally atop the Senate Foreign Relations Committee.

With Republicans back in the majority, Sen. Jim Risch of Idaho will become chairman of the powerful panel in January, returning to the role he held in 2019 and 2020. In an interview in his office at the Capitol on Thursday, Risch outlined a foreign policy philosophy that embraces Trump’s “America first” ethos without withdrawing from the world stage.

“The world’s on fire,” Risch said. “Trump coming back is going to be a real heaven-sent present to Americans. I think he can get a handle on this stuff that’s going on out there in the world.”

When Trump first took office in 2017, Russia had already invaded and annexed the Ukrainian territory of Crimea but hadn’t launched the full-scale invasion of Ukraine that began in 2022. The Israeli-Palestinian conflict that has since exploded was only simmering during Trump’s first term, when his administration worked to restore diplomatic ties between Israel and Arab nations while sidelining Palestinians.

Throughout his campaign, Trump pitched himself as the anti-war candidate and described U.S. foreign policy in simple terms. He repeatedly said he could end the war in Ukraine in a single day and promised “peace in the Middle East” in appeals to Jewish and Muslim voters, without saying how he would end the conflict in Gaza.

When Trump was asked during a debate in September if he wanted Ukraine to win the war with Russia, he replied, “I want the war to stop,” claiming that he has a good relationship with both Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy and Russian President Vladimir Putin and could bring them to a peace deal.

Risch said he took Trump’s promise to end the war in Ukraine in a single day seriously but not literally, “as a euphemism” meaning that the president-elect will make it a top priority. And the senator pointed to the impact Trump’s election has had on foreign leaders even before his inauguration, as outgoing President Joe Biden has receded from the world stage.

In his first term, Trump used threats to extract concessions from America’s allies and adversaries alike. In a news conference on Monday, the incoming president warned that if the 100 hostages that remain in Gaza aren’t released by the time he is inaugurated on Jan. 20, “all hell is going to break out.”

While acknowledging that “all hell has already broken out” in Gaza, Risch said it could always get worse and Trump’s threat seems to be pushing Hamas to negotiate an end to the war. On Thursday, a Hamas official told the Associated Press that cease-fire talks had resumed.

Israel’s offensive has killed more than 45,000 Palestinians, according to the United Nations, after Hamas and other Palestinian armed groups killed some 1,200 people in Israel and kidnapped 251 more, according to the Israeli government. Hamas negotiators have reportedly demanded a permanent cease-fire while Israel has insisted that any pause in fighting must be temporary and allow the eventual destruction of Hamas, which has governed Gaza despite being considered a terrorist group by the United States and other countries.

Many Democrats – with the notable exception of Biden – have grown increasingly critical of the Israeli military’s approach to the war, but Risch said he views the conflict “entirely different than the left does” and is confident that Trump is “going to back Israel all the way.”

“Every single thing that happens is absolutely at the feet of Hamas, not at the feet of Israel or the United States,” he said. “This was started by Hamas. It could be ended by Hamas anytime they want to.”

The war in Gaza – a densely populated territory roughly the size of Seattle – has had knock-on effects across the wider region, just as the war in Ukraine has shaken up an already unsettled world. One vivid example is Syria, where the embattled regime of Bashar al-Assad was propped up by Russia and Iran until those countries were forced to focus their resources, respectively, on Ukraine and Iranian proxies including Hamas in Gaza, Houthi rebels in Yemen and Hezbollah in Lebanon.

After a dozen years of civil war had seemingly resulted in a victory for the Assad regime, Syrian rebels took advantage of those geopolitical changes with a stunning offensive that swept across the country in barely a week and seized the capital of Damascus on Dec. 8, forcing Assad to flee to Russia. Risch said the regime’s fall is “reason for celebration,” but he cautioned that it’s unclear what comes next for Syria.

The Syrian opposition leader, Ahmad al-Sharaa, was designated as a terrorist by the United States with a $10 million bounty on his head when the group he then led was allied with al-Qaeda, but he cut ties with the jihadist group in 2016. Since taking control of Syria, he has pledged to protect the rights of ethnic and religious minorities and is asking the United States to lift sanctions on Syria’s economy.

Risch said he is encouraged by al-Sharaa’s promises but isn’t ready to support lifting sanctions and removing the terrorist designation on the de facto Syrian leader’s organization, Hay’at Tahrir al-Sham. That group’s opposition to Russia and Iran is a good thing, the senator said, but the United States should approach the new Syrian government with caution.

“I’ll be the first to say what they did was a long time ago, and also they’re saying and acting differently today than what they were,” Risch said. “How long does that last? I don’t know.”

The Pentagon announced on Thursday that it had more than doubled the number of U.S. troops in eastern Syria, to about 2,000, where they have been involved in efforts to prevent the so-called Islamic State group from regrouping.

Another crisis in the Arab world that has received far less attention in the United States is happening in Sudan, where a civil war between two factions of the military has displaced nearly 10 million people and left tens of thousands of civilians dead since it began in 2023. While foreign powers have intervened on both sides of Sudan’s war, Risch said there are “no good guys” for the United States to work with.

“To me, any money we spend there right now is of no consequence,” he said, noting that humanitarian aid is an exception. “They’re going to wind up having to resolve this themselves.”

Throughout the interview, Risch repeatedly said he agreed with Trump. Asked if there was any point on which he wasn’t on the same page as the incoming president, the senator said with a grin, “If I were, I probably wouldn’t talk about it here.”

“We didn’t always agree, but it was always very respectful,” Risch said of Trump’s first term, when the Idahoan was the committee’s top Republican. “And at the end of the day, he was always president, and I wasn’t.”

The Foreign Relations Committee has jurisdiction over the State Department and other agencies involved in foreign aid and national security, and its leader effectively has veto power over treaties with other countries.

Risch has remained a staunch supporter of Ukraine throughout its war with Russia, frequently reminding his fellow Republicans that the United States promised to protect Ukraine in exchange for the former Soviet republic giving up its nuclear weapons after the fall of the Berlin Wall. When asked if the U.S. government should negotiate a new nuclear nonproliferation deal with the Kremlin before the treaty known as New START expires in February 2026, the senator showed none of the openness toward Moscow that Trump has expressed.

“These people are cheaters, they’re liars, they’re murderers,” he said of Russia’s government. “They’re the worst kind of people on the planet, after what they did in Ukraine.”

In the short term, Risch and his fellow GOP senators have an opportunity to shape the new administration by confirming or rejecting Trump’s nominees for key roles, several of whom have been met with skepticism even from some Republicans. After former Rep. Matt Gaetz withdrew from consideration as attorney general – facing an ethics investigation related to alleged drug use and sex trafficking of a minor – attention has turned to Trump’s nominees for national security roles.

Pete Hegseth, an Army National Guard veteran and former Fox News host whom Trump nominated as defense secretary, has been dogged by reports of a drinking problem, financial mismanagement of veterans’ advocacy groups and a secret settlement he paid to a woman who accused him of sexual assault in 2017. His advocacy for U.S. troops found guilty of war crimes and opposition to women serving in combat roles have also provoked controversy.

Some GOP senators – including Joni Ernst of Iowa, a sexual assault survivor and the first female combat veteran to serve in the Senate – suggested they might oppose Hegseth’s nomination until Trump and his allies criticized them and threatened to back primary challenges to any Republican who votes against his confirmation.

“Everybody’s making a big deal about this,” Risch said when asked about Hegseth. “We vote to support our president’s appointees. I voted for all of them last time. I’m going to vote for all of them this time. He’s the president of the United States and he’s entitled to deference on this, short of there being some real disaster.”

Risch backed all of Trump’s nominees for cabinet positions in 2017. He also voted for Biden’s nominees for secretary of state, Antony Blinken, and defense secretary, Lloyd Austin, in 2021. But he was one of 10 Senate Republicans who voted against confirming Biden’s nominee for director of national intelligence, Avril Haines.

Tulsi Gabbard, a former Democratic congresswoman whom Trump nominated to oversee the nation’s 18 intelligence agencies as director of national intelligence, has drawn criticism for echoing Kremlin talking points and meeting with Assad at a time when the former Syrian dictator was treated as a pariah by the U.S. government. In her home state of Hawaii, critics have also raised concerns about Gabbard’s ties to a secretive religious sect that defectors have described as a cult.

Risch’s counterpart on the House Foreign Affairs Committee, Chairman Michael McCaul, R-Texas, told the Texas Tribune last week that Gabbard’s nomination is “baffling.” But Risch said he doesn’t share that sentiment.

“I have no concerns that there would be detriment to the United States, or I wouldn’t be voting to confirm,” the senator said.

In contrast to those nominees, Trump’s pick for secretary of state, Republican Sen. Marco Rubio of Florida, appears to be a shoo-in and Risch said he intends to confirm him on Trump’s first day in office. Risch and Rubio serve together on both the Foreign Relations and Intelligence committees and Risch joked that he could think of just one other senator he would be more comfortable sending to lead the State Department – himself.

Risch said he never sought that position himself, but when the Trump administration is handed the keys to U.S. foreign policy in January, the Idaho senator will be riding shotgun.

Asked to describe the philosophy that will guide his work as chairman, Risch drew a contrast with one of his predecessors, Sen. William Borah, a fellow Idaho Republican who led the Foreign Relations Committee from 1924 to 1933. Borah was a prominent isolationist, opposing the United States joining the League of Nations after World War I, but Risch said that position doesn’t make sense in today’s world.

“The world’s changed and isolationism doesn’t work,” Risch said. “Having said that, we can’t be doing everything everywhere all the time to try to straighten out the world. If we’ve learned anything from recent wars, it’s that if you’re going to help another country, they’ve got to want it more than you want it. That wasn’t the case in Afghanistan. You have to use your resources in a smart way.”