Robert De Niro once played the toughest men in America.
Now he wanders the halls of the Supreme Court mumbling about a president he can't explain.
When a reporter asked him last week to name his main criticism of Donald Trump, the 82-year-old gave one word – and then ran out of things to say.
De Niro at the Supreme Court Birthright Citizenship Hearing
A reporter caught De Niro outside the Supreme Court on Wednesday, where he had come to watch oral arguments on birthright citizenship.
Asked what he thought of Trump calling him a TDS case, De Niro said, "Nonsense."
Asked what his main criticism of the president is, De Niro said, "Everything."
Then he paused.
Then he added, "Everything that we all know now" – and stopped.
No specifics.
No argument.
No case.
This is the man who has called Trump "a piece of shit," "a nasty little bitch," "damaged," "evil," and "an enemy of the United States."
He once said he'd like to punch Trump "in the face."
He narrated a Biden campaign ad predicting a Trump "bloodbath" if the president returned to power.
He flew to Cannes last year to call Trump "a philistine president" in front of a room full of Europeans.
Fifteen years of this – and when finally handed a microphone and asked to make the case, he said "everything" and went quiet.
Robert De Niro Box Office Flops While He Attacks Trump
When asked how he thought the birthright citizenship arguments went, De Niro said, "I'm not sure, because I could hear, but not hear. It's complicated. So, I can't say."
The man who commanded the screen in Raging Bull and The Godfather Part II sat through two hours of constitutional argument and came away unable to form a sentence.
His take on the Trump administration's position – that children born to parents here illegally are not automatically citizens – was that Republicans just want to "get rid of people they don't want."
"It's that simple," De Niro insisted.
It is that simple – if you've given up thinking and decided to feel instead.
https://twitter.com/WallStreetApes/status/2038047837389468058?s=20
Meanwhile, Trump's own Supreme Court appointees were in that same room asking the toughest questions about his executive order.
Amy Coney Barrett.
Neil Gorsuch.
These are Trump's justices – grilling his own solicitor general.
That is how a constitutional republic works.
De Niro sat in the audience and couldn't process what he was watching.
The Real Derangement Is at the Box Office
Here is what Trump Derangement Syndrome actually looks like in practice.
In March 2025, De Niro starred in The Alto Knights – a mob drama where he played two roles.
It opened to $3.1 million domestically.
Against a $45 million budget.
It landed in sixth place its opening weekend – behind a Disney remake.
The trade press declared it among the year's worst performers.
The film lost an estimated $35 million.
His previous picture, Tin Soldier, reportedly lost $45 million.
His last four films have collectively burned through more than $120 million in losses for their studios.
De Niro has spent years screaming into cameras that Trump is destroying America – and America has responded by refusing to buy tickets to his films.
That is not a coincidence.
Half the country watched him stand outside a Manhattan courthouse in 2024 calling Trump "a grubby real estate hustler" and made a decision.
https://twitter.com/MarcoFoster_/status/2037949546051875177?s=20
The decision was: we're done.
Fifteen Years of Calling Trump Every Name and Nothing to Show for It
There is a long list of words De Niro has used to describe Trump since 2011.
Racist.
Evil.
Clown.
Tyrant.
Punk.
Bozo.
Nasty little b***h.
Wannabe tough guy.
Enemy of the country.
Now add "damaged."
The man has called Trump every name in the English language – and insists he doesn't have a derangement problem.
When you've spent fifteen years building your entire public identity around hating one person, when you can't attend a film festival without mentioning him, when you can't walk past a reporter without launching into a rant, when you sit inside the Supreme Court and come out unable to form a sentence – that's not political passion.
That's a man who lost himself somewhere around 2016 and never found his way back.
Trump called it correctly.
De Niro went on camera to deny it and proved the diagnosis right in real time.
Sources:
- Alana Mastrangelo, "Watch: Trump Saying Robert De Niro Suffers from TDS Sends Actor over the Edge," Breitbart News, April 4, 2026.
- Christian Toto, "Anti-Trump De Niro: Box Office Poison," Hollywood in Toto, March 26, 2025.
- "Robert De Niro's Recent Films Flop Big, Losing Millions at the Box Office," Comic Basics, September 30, 2025.
- "Robert De Niro's Trump Obsession and Hollywood's Hypocrisy," American Thinker, May 17, 2025.
- Amy Howe, "Supreme Court Appears Likely to Side Against Trump on Birthright Citizenship," SCOTUSblog, April 1, 2026.
