On November 1, 2025, President Donald Trump threatened to end all U.S. assistance to Nigeria and — if he deemed it necessary — launch a military attack against insurgents in the country. As National Public Radio reported:

“If the Nigerian Government continues to allow the killing of Christians, the U.S.A. will immediately stop all aid and assistance to Nigeria, and may very well go into that now disgraced country, ‘guns-a-blazing,’ to completely wipe out the Islamic Terrorists who are committing these horrible atrocities,” Trump posted on social media. “I am hereby instructing our Department of War to prepare for possible action. If we attack, it will be fast, vicious, and sweet, just like the terrorist thugs attack our CHERISHED Christians!”

Trump’s threats garnered worldwide attention. The Nigerian government rejected his characterization of conditions in the country, but also indicated that it “would welcome U.S. help in fighting Islamist insurgents as long as its territorial integrity is respected.” A number of interest groups — some through with the help of lobbyists in Washington — weighed in as well.

Countries of Political Concern

In 2020, the first Trump administration designated Nigeria as a Country of Particular Concern (CPC) under the 1998 International Religious Freedom Act. 

The President is required to annually review the status of religious freedom in every country in the world and designate each country the government of which has engaged in or tolerated “particularly severe violations of religious freedom” as a Country of Particular Concern (CPC). The law defines particularly severe violations as “systematic, ongoing, egregious violations of religious freedom,” including violations such as: (1) torture; (2) prolonged detention without charges; (3) forced disappearance; or (4) other flagrant denial of life, liberty, or security of persons.

Trump placed Nigeria on the CPC list again this year. Nigeria is not the only current CPC. In 2023, the United States designated a number of countries as CPCs, including China, Iran, and Cuba. The Act also creates a category for non-state actors — Entities of Particular Concern — which currently includes a number of Islamist groups, such as various ISIS affiliates and Boko Haram. 

The United States has a long history of creating official lists of adversaries (as do other countries). Readers are likely familiar with the practice of designating organizations as terrorists and states as sponsors of terrorism. However, the International Religious Freedom Act, has proven well-suited to Trump’s right-wing politics. It provides a way to selectively label some countries as intolerant — and therefore the legitimate target of economic, military, and diplomatic coercion. It should come as little surprise that the countries that receive this designation are seldom closely allied to the United States and generally lack political influence in Washington.

Bullying, Name-Calling, and International Order

Many observers argue that Trump’s political tactics resemble those of a schoolyard bully. But his recent statementsabout Nigeria — especially when understood in the context of the long-standing practice of officially labeling some entities and regimes as “bad actors” — provide a window into a broader phenomenon: bullying as a discourse and practice of international ordering. That is, as a way of creating, upholding, and transforming the texture of world politics.

One of the most common ways that international-relations scholars define “international order” is in terms of the prevailing “rules, norms, and institutional arrangements” that structure relations among states. There is nothing wrong with these accounts, so long as we treat them as a first approximation. Political orders, international and otherwise, are fundamentally ways of organizing power. If we want to understand how they work, we need to pay attention to how discourses and practices order international relations. 

One of the key ways that discourse and practices generate political order is by creating a variety of subject positions — in crude terms, identities, social roles, figures, or characters. Designating Nigeria as a CPC places it within multiple, overlapping discourses and practices. It thus activates a broader array of potential “characters” or “figures,” including “bullies” and “anti-bullies,” “bystanders” and “supporters,” “Christendom” and “Islam,” and “liberal order” and its “opponents.”

These subject positions are essentially unstable. Neither their relative importance nor how they relate to one another are set in stone. Many different actors help to constitute subject positions, often by contesting their meanings or rejecting them outright. Here, the list of “players” includes the Trump administration, the Nigerian government, celebrities, politicians such as Ted Cruz, evangelicals in the United States, and other interest groups both within and outside of Nigeria.

Trump’s rhetoric taps into a broader narrative, one that represents Christians and the “Christian World” as a referent object facing an existential threat from “Islamic Terrorists.” This re-echoes familiar civilizationist, racist, and Islamophobic narratives that underpinned the Global War on Terror — including the construction of Nigeria as a “disgraced country,” a failed or weak state unable to protect its own Christian citizens and secure their ability to practice their faith. 

Nigeria thus needs to be “bullied” — threatened and coerced — into submission, either by “correcting” its failures or through military intervention. Of course, the “bully” claims that its victim is the one at fault — the one failing to comply with prevailing norms of appropriate conduct. But, in this case, the bully itself is trying to renegotiate or subvert existing norms, such as sovereign equality.

The Nigerian government, including the president and the foreign affairs minister, denies allegations of “Christian genocide” in Nigeria. Its president, Bola Tinubu, re-emphasized Nigeria’s own efforts to “safeguard freedom of religion and belief for all Nigerians.” Tinbu. does not deny his country’s wider security challenges — including terrorist insurgency in the northeast, kidnapping and banditry in many parts of the northwest and northcentral regions, clashes between herders and farmers, and violence perpetrated by separatist groups in the southeast.

Interest groups and leaders within Nigeria, as well as members of the Nigerian diaspora, argue that these conditions stem from widespread political corruption and mismanagement. This reinvigorates bullying narratives that portray the Nigerian state as predatory and conscientiously aloof. For some, it could be described as a government of bullies; for others, one marked by foolishness and indulgence.

Nigeria’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs, in a press release, reiterated the government’s commitment to promoting national unity by providing security for all citizens and emphasised the importance of diplomacy and partnership with those who believe in “genuine peace.” The statement also referenced principles such as freedom and democracy, both of which are elements of the now-threatened “rules-based international order.” 

In this way, the press release invokes an anti-bullying discourse. It seeks to uphold Nigeria’s sovereignty in the face of ambivalence and despotism. Its construction of Nigeria as “God-fearing” and inclusive is consistent with the official discourse on terrorism and counterterrorism. This discourse portrays religious and ethnic diversity as the basis for forming a stronger national bond. In this context, however, the press release invokes national diversity as a counter-discourse to accusations of Christian persecution; it points towards other forms of diplomatic engagement, ones supposedly grounded in cooperation, allyship, and interdependence.

Competing Visions of Order

These unfolding events highlight ongoing geopolitical transformations, most notably the growing challenges faced by the so-called liberal international order. They also point to the existence of multiple visions of order — including one centered on a global Christian dominion in which Trump plays the role of revered potentate. 

Trump’s rhetoric clearly resonate with his right-wing base, evangelicals, and various groups in Nigeria, including Christians. For them, Trump’s statements demonstrate his commitment to faith and his decisiveness against adversaries. At the same time, they offer a global order less reliant on accepted norms, cooperation, and mutuality. This global oder gives pride of place to “cherished Christians” who must be protected from the threat posed by Islamic terrorists — and by any necessary means. 

In contrast, the Nigerian government’s references to global cooperation and “rules-based order” invoke a different kind of order, one in which relations between states are built on principles of mutual respect, cooperation, and sovereignty — so long as those values leave government officials free to use their positions for personal gain, distribute opportunities and resources to their clientele networks, and enjoy the perquisites they claim for themselves

Each of these visions identify bullies and victims. Each of them license ‘the right kinds of victims’ to bully others. And this is why discourses and practices of bullying play an important role in the process of international ordering.