The Nobel committee announced the winner of the 2025 Nobel Peace Prize is Venezuelan democracy activist Maria Corina Machado.
This morning, the Nobel committee announced the winner of the 2025 Nobel Peace Prize is Maria Corina Machado, “for her tireless work promoting democratic rights for the people of Venezuela and for her struggle to achieve a just and peaceful transition from dictatorship to democracy.”
This is likely to spur a presidential tirade on Truth Social later today; already this morning, White House communications director Steven Cheung posted on X, “President Trump will continue making peace deals, ending wars, and saving lives. He has the heart of a humanitarian, and there will never be anyone like him who can move mountains with the sheer force of his will. The Nobel Committee proved they place politics over peace.”
In this case, President Trump has a stronger argument than usual. The most recent headline is the nascent ceasefire and peace deal between Israel and Hamas that is expected to get the rest of the hostages released. Just about everyone, left, right and center would agree that if the administration’s efforts really do build a lasting peace between Israel and the Palestinians, he deserves not just the Nobel Peace Prize but probably first-ballot induction into whatever Hall of Fame the Nobel Committee has. And even if it doesn’t, Trump and his team deserve credit for putting considerable time and effort into ameliorating a conflict that appeared utterly intractable.
Beyond that, Trump likes to boast that he ended seven wars –Armenia and Azerbaijan, Cambodia and Thailand, Israel and Iran, India and Pakistan, Rwanda and the Democratic Republic of Congo, Egypt and Ethiopia (which are not really at war but in a dispute over a hydroelectric project) and Serbia and Kosovo. Trump’s oft-repeated boast is a wild exaggeration, but does reflect that Trump is eager to host talks between just about any two countries that are in conflict and cajole them into ending the fight. There’s something to be said for the message, “the American president wants the conflict to end, and wants to know if there’s anything he can do to get to peace.”
(Having just spent some time in India, I can tell you that the Indians do not like Trump running around boasting that he ended a war that they perceive as ending on their terms, because the objective was accomplished.) Your mileage may vary on which action in Trump’s first year in office you believe did the most to contribute to world peace, but I would note that the Iranian nuclear weapons program, arguably one of the most menacing and destabilizing forces in the world, could not be reached for comment, because it’s under a giant pile of rubble.
Our old friend Jay Nordlinger wrote the definitive modern assessment of the Nobel Peace Prize in his book, Peace, They Say. There have been no shortage of controversial choices, and I suspect that the Nobel committee inflicted lasting damage to its reputation in American circles in 2009 when it awarded the prize to Barack Obama, more or less on potential and as a not-so-subtle rebuke to George W. Bush. (Obama had been in office for two weeks when he was nominated, eight months or so when he was named the winner.) At the time, the Los Angeles Times editorial board wrote, “it’s difficult to see why he deserves the peace prize so soon after taking office. The Nobel committee didn’t just embarrass Obama, it diminished the credibility of the prize itself… Other political leaders have received the prize for real accomplishments.”
It’s easy to conclude that the Nobel committee – five Norwegian citizens elected to six-year terms— is simply never going to give the award to Trump. He’s anathema to almost all their instincts – brash, combative, boastful, furious with his domestic political opponents, quick to deploy military force, not just abroad but also on the streets of American cities.
Still, Trump can console himself with the fact that a lot of historical figures who would seem like slam-dunk choices for the Nobel Peace Prize never received one, including India’s Mahatma Ghandi, the Philippines’ Corazon Aquino, and the Czech Republic’s Vaclav Havel.