When Palau and Marshall Islands are judged by standards Washington won't apply to itself

Inside the Reef By Joyce McClure

  When the U.S. State Department sanctioned Palau Senate President Hokkons Baules and former Marshall Islands mayor Anderson Jibas, the language was unequivocal.

• They “abused” their public positions. • They engaged in “theft, misuse and abuse” of funds.

• They “wasted U.S. taxpayer money.”

• Their conduct “eroded public trust” and created “opportunity for malign foreign influence.”

The consequence was swift: Hokkons and Jibbas, along with their immediate family members, were barred from entering the United States.

That is what accountability looks like when Washington is looking outward.

Now let’s look inward.

Donald Trump is the sitting president of the United States, serving a second nonconsecutive term. He was impeached twice by the U.S. House of Representatives, first in 2019 for abuse of power and obstruction of Congress, and again in 2021 for incitement of insurrection following the Jan. 6 attack on the U.S. Capitol.

In 2024, he was convicted in New York of 34 felony counts of falsifying business records. In a separate civil fraud case, a New York court imposed hundreds of millions of dollars in penalties for financial misrepresentation.

These are not partisan accusations. They are congressional actions and court judgments.

Yet he occupies the Oval Office.

If corruption “erodes public trust” in Majuro, what do two impeachments and a felony conviction mean for public trust in Washington?

The State Department argues—correctly—that corruption weakens institutions. It distorts governance. It harms ordinary citizens. It creates instability. It opens doors for foreign influence.

Those principles do not change depending on geography.

In the Marshall Islands, misappropriation of trust funds intended for nuclear survivors was described as contributing to job loss, food insecurity, unreliable electricity and migration to the United States. The logic is clear: when public funds are abused, citizens pay the price.

And that logic applies everywhere.

The United States positions itself in the Pacific as the democratic alternative to China—transparent where Beijing is opaque, accountable where Beijing is transactional. Washington warns island governments about elite capture, bribery and foreign influence tied to financial entanglements. And it is not wrong to do so.

But credibility in that argument depends on consistency.

During and after his presidency, Trump properties have hosted tournaments funded by Saudi Arabia’s Public Investment Fund through the LIV Golf series—a sovereign wealth fund controlled by the Saudi government. The arrangement has been widely reported and criticized by ethics experts as raising conflict-of-interest concerns, particularly given the intersection of foreign policy, national security and private business interests.

Questions have also surrounded foreign investments and financial relationships involving Trump-affiliated entities and family ventures during and after his time in office. While some of these dealings may be legal under U.S. law, ethics scholars have repeatedly raised concerns about the blending of public power and private financial gain tied to foreign capital.

Donald Trump

That is precisely the dynamic Washington warns Pacific nations about.

The State Department’s own language focused not only on theft, but on “opportunity for malign foreign influence.” Corruption is dangerous, Washington argues, because it makes governments vulnerable.

If that is true in Palau, it is true on Pennsylvania Avenue. No one in Palau or Majuro needs a civics lesson from Washington. Leaders across Micronesia follow American politics closely. They understand impeachment. They understand criminal conviction. They understand civil penalties imposed by courts.

They also understand double standards.

If “abuse of public power for personal gain” disqualifies a Palauan official from entering the United States, Americans must confront what it means when comparable findings of misconduct do not disqualify their own national leaders from holding power.

Supporters will argue that impeachment is political, that criminal convictions are being appealed, that civil judgments are part of adversarial litigation. All of that is part of the American system.

But so is accountability.

The Pacific has endured nuclear testing under U.S. authority, strategic marginalization during the Cold War, and now renewed geopolitical competition between Washington and Beijing. It is once again being told that alignment with the United States is alignment with democratic integrity.

That claim requires more than military agreements and infrastructure grants. It requires moral authority.

When Washington lectures small island states about governance standards while absorbing ethical controversies, impeachments and felony convictions at the highest level of its own government, it invites corrosive skepticism.

And that skepticism weakens alliances.

The competition between the United States and China in the Pacific is not only about runways, radar systems and fiber-optic cables; it is about narrative, about which model of governance deserves trust.

The American argument rests on the rule of law. The rule of law cannot be selectively applied.

If corruption erodes public trust abroad, it erodes it at home. If foreign entanglements create vulnerability in Micronesia, they create vulnerability anywhere. If misuse of public power warrants sanction overseas, it must carry political consequences domestically. Otherwise, anti-corruption becomes an instrument of foreign policy rather than a democratic principle. And small nations notice that distinction.

Pacific leaders understand leverage. They understand that powerful countries often enforce standards asymmetrically. What they are watching now is whether the United States holds itself to the same threshold it demands of others.

This is not about party loyalty; it is about institutional integrity.

The United States cannot credibly condemn elite capture abroad while normalizing conduct at home that has resulted in impeachments, felony convictions and massive civil penalties. It cannot warn island governments about vulnerability to foreign influence while dismissing concerns about foreign-linked financial relationships involving its own head of state.

And it cannot claim the mantle of anti-corruption leadership while treating accountability as a geopolitical tool.

If corruption is disqualifying in Palau, it cannot be survivable in Washington.

Democracy cannot export accountability; it refuses to enforce it at home.

And the Pacific — long treated as a strategic chessboard — is watching to see whether America believes its own words.

  Joyce McClure is a former senior marketing executive and former Peace Corps volunteer in Yap. Transitioning to freelance writing, she moved to Guam in 2021 and recently relocated back to the mainland. Send feedback to joycemcc62@yahoo.com 

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