POLITICO
The leader of NATO said he’s not concerned about the U.S. pulling out of the alliance even if former President Donald Trump wins reelection in November.
“I’m confident that the United States will remain a staunch ally” no matter who wins, Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg said in an interview Wednesday during his dayslong visit to Washington.
The NATO chief is in town to make his pitch that supporting Ukraine and rearming NATO — issues that are inexorably intertwined — helps the U.S. in the Pacific and creates American jobs.
“I worked with former President Trump for the four years he was president,” Stoltenberg told POLITICO, when Trump repeatedly threatened to leave the alliance as he thundered about NATO allies failing to keep up with defense spending pledges.
The NATO chief also pointed to the traditional bipartisan support for NATO in Congress, something he said he witnessed on Tuesday while meeting with Republican and Democratic lawmakers on Capitol Hill.
Stoltenberg also noted that Trump’s criticism of NATO wasn’t really aimed at the alliance, but at individual countries that have failed to live up to the 2014 pledge to spend 2 percent of their GDP on defense by 2024. “It’s important to listen,” he said, because the criticism from Trump “is not a criticism of NATO not investing enough in NATO.”
The comments came immediately after the NATO leader made a pitch to conservatives in Washington that supporting Ukraine and re-arming Europe is good for America.
“NATO is a good deal for the United States,” Stoltenberg said at the Heritage Foundation, a conservative think tank closely aligned with Trump.
Stoltenberg’s trip to D.C. comes at the start of a tumultuous year for the alliance, Ukraine, and American domestic politics, with major questions hanging over those relationships and their future together.
His speech at Heritage reflects the uncertainty Europe is feeling over the U.S. political scene with the unpredictable Trump potentially reoccupying the Oval Office, making this particular think tank an essential stop.
Even though support for Ukraine is strong in some Republican circles, Trump has been pushing Congress to walk away from a plan to fund Ukraine, Israel and Taiwan due to a clash over border policy.
Stoltenberg’s remarks were an effort to tie multiple issues together that concern U.S. lawmakers, making the case that no issue — China, Russia, migration — exists by itself.
“China, Russia, Iran, and North Korea are increasingly aligned,” Stoltenberg said. “Together, they subvert sanctions and pressure, weaken the U.S. dollar-based international financial system, fuel Russia’s war in Europe, and exploit challenges to our societies, such as terrorism, disruptive technologies, or migration.”
In his opening remarks, Heritage President Kevin Roberts…
