Georgian Dream officials have offered supporters the same message for the better part of a year: a reset with Washington is close at hand. George Melashvili, chairman of the Europe-Georgia Institute, a Tbilisi based think-tank that follows Georgia's foreign policy and its relations with the West, argues that the promise has been repeated so often, and broken so consistently, that it now functions more as a domestic political tool than a genuine diplomatic goal.

Much of that optimism traces back to Donald Trump's return to power, when Georgian Dream officials calculated that perceived ideological common ground, on issues from migration to what the party casts as Western liberal overreach, would translate into a friendlier Washington.

"Georgian Dream has been trying to build a relationship with the new administration since the very beginning," Melashvili said. "In January they were promising their own supporters that Trump's inauguration was coming, everything would be fine, everything would be ideal. None of these expectations has eventually transformed into reality."

He points to a pattern rather than a single incident. There were predictions of a phone call between Trump and Georgian President Mikheil Kavelashvili that never happened. There were assurances in May from Prime Minister Irakli Kobakhidze that a State Department delegation would resolve outstanding disputes. And there were pledges around the July 1 US independence day reception in Tbilisi that relations would soon improve. Each of these, Melashvili argues, was used domestically to manage expectations rather than to reflect genuine diplomatic progress.

The most recent example came on July 28. The US embassy in Georgia issued a statement criticising the interior ministry's Division for Combatting Hate Speech and calling on Georgian authorities to allow political opposition to function. The embassy described it as its first major public criticism of the ruling party since Trump returned to office. The division has been operating since June and has opened dozens of administrative cases. Two government critics, journalist Vakho Sanaia and activist Giorgi Akhobadze, have already been sentenced to detention over social media posts.

That statement fits into a longer stretch of friction. In June, Secretary of State Marco Rubio told a congressional hearing that Washington had outlined to Georgian officials what improved relations would require and had received "some positive responses". He said he hoped to see a change in Georgia's "trajectory". Kobakhidze pushed back publicly. Speaking to reporters in Tbilisi, he said Georgia was "not a school student who can be picked apart".

Underneath the rhetoric, the substantive issues have not moved. The Biden administration sanctioned Bidzina Ivanishvili, the billionaire founder and honorary chairman of Georgian Dream who is widely regarded as the country's de facto leader, in 2024. That same year, Washington suspended the US-Georgia strategic partnership agreement after Tbilisi delayed EU accession talks. Neither measure has been reversed under Trump.

Georgia's isolation is also visible in the itinerary of senior US officials. Vice President JD Vance visited both Armenia and Azerbaijan in February, signing a strategic partnership charter in Baku, and Rubio made a brief stop in Yerevan in May to sign a further round of agreements with Armenia. Neither has visited Georgia. Analysts have noted that the last sitting US secretary of state to visit the South Caucasus at all was Hillary Clinton, in 2012.

Melashvili argues that reversing the two measures, rather than any broader strategic realignment with Washington, is what actually motivates Georgian Dream's outreach. "I don't think there is anything connected to national interests when it comes to the relations between Georgian Dream and the United States," he said. "It's all about one person getting back money that the person believes was taken away from him by the Americans."

That reading gives context to some of the party's more visible gestures toward the Trump orbit. One is a planned Trump Tower project in Tbilisi involving the Trump Organization and Georgian developers, on a site with ownership links to Ivanishvili's family. It is a second attempt at a Trump-branded project in Georgia. An earlier plan for Batumi, floated under former president Mikheil Saakashvili, was never built. Melashvili is skeptical this one will fare differently.

He argues that Georgian Dream misreads how Western governments, including the current US administration, actually operate, and says Georgian Dream's domestic agenda is not compatible with Western policy towards Georgia. 

"What they [Georgian Dream] want is to be left alone," he said, likening the party's ambitions to Azerbaijan's governing model. "They want to have total, unlimited control over Georgia."

Georgian Dream's position in Brussels has also thinned. Former Hungarian prime minister Viktor Orban, who had used Hungary's EU veto to blunt sanctions pressure on Tbilisi, lost power in April. Melashvili called Orban the party's "main shield" in the EU. Other governments, including Slovakia's, have been floated as potential replacements in that blocking role, though none has matched Orban's consistency on Georgia specifically.

Looking ahead, Melashvili sees two forces with any real capacity to shift Georgian Dream's course. One is sustained domestic protest, now well past 500 consecutive days in Tbilisi. Protests have been ongoing in Georgia after Georgian Dream announced in late 2024 it was halting accession talks with the EU. The announcement came weeks after a disputed parliamentary election that many Georgians saw as a concession to Moscow and which international observers warned was marred by serious irregularities.

The other is coordinated pressure from Washington and Brussels, which he says has so far been limited relative to what is available. "There is no such thing as a stalemate," he said. "The Americans have not made any moves on their own. If Georgian Dream will continue this confrontational course, the Americans will have to make their own moves."

For now the two sides are largely at an impasse. Tbilisi continues to speak of a reset built on mutual respect. Washington's recent signals, from the embassy's free speech rebuke to a new bond requirement of up to $20,000 for Georgian visa applicants, suggest its patience for that framing will not hold much longer.

"They know that there are lots of leverages that the West can use," Melashvili said. "If those leverages are used, Georgian Dream will be much more susceptible to ideas coming from the US or the European Union."