As President Donald Trump deals with the fallout from embarrassing images from his recent appearance at the 2026 World Economic Forum, a phot of the 79-year-old rabble-rouser at the summit has resurfaced as a reminder of his longstanding unpopularity on the world stage.
Trump appeared worn out, stressed, and feeble in Davos, Switzerland, on Jan. 21 when he sat down for a bilateral meeting with Swiss President Guy Parmelin. His disheveled look ignited widespread ridicule and alarm across the globe.
That viral picture of the Republican politician became a trending topic online. Within days, social media users began dogpiling on a weakened Trump by digging up a nearly decade-old photo of the New York City native being completely ignored by other world leaders.
Trump was captured sitting alone at a table at the beginning of the plenary session at the 2017 Group of 20 forum in Hamburg, Germany, which took place during his first presidential term. He sat next to two empty chairs. His eyes appeared closed as other attendees conversed around him.
“I would like to nominate the photographer for a Nobel Peace Prize for this remarkable photography,” a Threads poster wrote as the caption for the image of a lonely-looking Trump positioned in front of his laughing peers.
A second person chimed in, “Nobody wants to be in proximity to him.” Former President Joe Biden got a backhanded shoutout when a third person clowned Trump by writing, “Looks worse than Sleepy Joe!”
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Trump was the main target of mockery, but an unknown person standing behind him in the picture caught the attention of online quipsters. The mystery man has a smirk on his face while he speaks to two additional smiling men.
‘That dude in the back,” one Threads user commented, along with three face with tears of joy emojis, which led to someone creating a fake thoughts quote for the diplomat that had him calling Trump an “a–hole.” Another person said, “OMG. He deserves it. Wow, that picture says a lot.”
Additionally, the aloof former “The Apprentice” reality television show star was depicted in the edited photo thinking, “Nobody loves me. Everybody hates me! Going to the garden to eat worms!”
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One individual had a different theory for what Trump had on his mind in that moment of being completely separated from everyone else at the G20 by suggesting, “He’s pretending to be reading… We all know he doesn’t read anything, ever!!!”
“I know what he’s thinking, ‘Where is my God damn fish fillet sandwich!?’” offered one theorist, playing on Trump’s well-known favorite diet of fast food restaurant meals such as McDonald’s and KFC.
Like with his attendance at the 2026 World Economic Forum, Trump’s G20 trip in 2017 was also marred by his inconsistent policy proposals and combative rhetoric, leaving Europeans dignitaries scratching their heads.
“Generally, Trump didn’t impress very many leaders on [the] European side,” said European Council on Foreign Relations official Susi Dennison in 2017, despite the American president insisting G20 was a “great success” for the United States.
Trump just hit the one-year mark in his second term, and his reputation for not being well-liked at the top levels of the international world order continues to be reinforced by visuals that seem to further fuel his harshest critics.
Whether at the G20 in 2017 or the World Economic Forum in 2026, Trump has not been able to escape the unrelenting public scrutiny on how he presents himself when in the company of his global counterparts.
