suck up to

This investor, Justin Sun, made it clear that he was doing it to suck up to Trump with a post on X saying he's committed to "making America great again."

Old stuff doesn’t matter that much to Trump so long as someone is willing to suck up to him in the present.

A clown car full of grifters and kooks, meanwhile, used the primaries as an opportunity to suck up to Trump, whom everyone knew would inevitably be the nominee.

“Again, that’s not the point, the point is to suck up to their Dear Leader.”

Yes, he is a shallow, puerile narcissist who loves to suck up to tyrants so they'll let him into the strongman club but that doesn't fully explain his apparently endless need to prove his fealty to Vladimir Putin.