Transactional U.S. Foreign Policy + Who Are America’s Friends Now?

The Spillover · Oct 29, 2026 · 52m

The Trump administration is pursuing a transactional style of U.S. foreign policy, leaving friends and adversaries uncertain about what Washington wants. This week on The Spillover, host Rebecca Patterson and Jim Steinberg, dean of SAIS at Johns Hopkins University, unpack how Washington’s deal-making approach is playing out in Ukraine, Taiwan, AI governance, and the Iran war, and what could replace the U.S.-led global order that has persisted for the past eighty years.

Host:

Rebecca Patterson, Senior Fellow, Council on Foreign Relations (CFR)

Guest:

James Steinberg, Dean of the School of…