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The Cheering Crowd For Trump In Poland Was Bussed In To Make Him Happy

by John Haltiwanger
Zach Gibson/Getty Images

President Donald Trump delivered a speech in Warsaw, Poland, on Thursday, and was met by a cheering crowd.

You might be thinking to yourself: "They actually like Trump in Poland?"

After all, polling shows he's not exactly the most popular leader worldwide, and he's been booed upon his arrival in other European countries.

Well, the ruling political party in Poland seemed to be cognizant of this. They planned ahead, promised Trump a warm reception, and bussed in people from around the country that would be cooperative and cheer him on, BBC News reports.

Trump is actually pretty unpopular in Poland.

A recent Pew Research Center survey showed just 23 percent of Poles felt confident in Trump to "do the right thing regarding world affairs."

So, roughly three out of four Poles don't feel confident about Trump's leadership.

Comparatively, 58 percent of Poles expressed confidence in former President Barack Obama toward the end of his tenure.

Pew Research Center

So, it seems the Polish government wanted to create the illusion that Poles are actually fond of Trump by bussing people in.

With that said, Professor Aleks Szczerbiak, an expert on Polish politics at the University of Sussex, did note to BBC News that "pretty much every American president" will get a "warm welcome" in Poland unless they do something wrong.

So, in spite of the lack of confidence in Trump in Poland, perhaps the bussed-in crowds weren't even necessary.

While in Poland, Trump bashed Obama, the U.S. intelligence community, and the American media.

Indeed, the President of the United States went to a foreign country to trash his predecessor, the people who gather intelligence for the sake of the country's safety, and the American free press.

It's worth noting freedom of the press has recently been under attack in Poland, so Trump's condemnation of the U.S. media doesn't set a great example.

Trump also gave Poland an awkward lesson in its own history during his speech.

It almost seemed as if Trump was reading from Wikipedia as he discussed some of the darker moments in Poland's past.

President Trump's next stop is Hamburg, Germany, for the G20 summit. There, he will have his first official meeting with Russian President Vladimir Putin, which is highly anticipated.