Trump calls the European Union a foe of the United States
President Trump included the European Union when rattling off a list of the “biggest foes” of the United States throughout the world.
The “CBS Evening News” published the interview with Trump from his golf club in Turnberry, Scotland, on Sunday morning. Alongside Russia and China, Trump mentioned the EU, which includes several of the oldest, closest allies of the United States, when asked about the country’s global foes.
“Well, I think we have a lot of foes. I think the European Union is a foe, what they do to us in trade. Now, you wouldn’t think of the European Union, but they’re a foe. Russia’s a foe in certain respects. China’s a foe economically, certainly they are a foe. But that doesn’t mean they are bad. It doesn’t mean anything. It means that they’re competitors,” Trump told CBS anchor Jeff Glor on Sunday. “They want to do well, and we want to do well.”
This comment comes on the heels of Trump’s advising British Prime Minister Theresa May to sue the EU to resolve tense negotiations over the United Kingdom’s looming exit from the political and economic union that currently includes 28 member states.
Glor pointed out that many people might be surprised to hear Trump list the EU as a foe before Russia and China. Trump responded that he “looks” at everybody and loves many European countries — noting that he has family ties to Scotland and Germany.
“Don’t forget both of my parents were born in EU sectors, OK? I mean, my mother was Scotland. My father was Germany,” Trump said.
Although his mother, Mary Anne MacLeod Trump, was born in Scotland, his father, Fred Trump, was, in fact, born in New York City. His grandfather Frederick Trump was born in Germany.
“I love those countries. I respect the leaders of those countries. But, in a trade sense, they’ve really taken advantage of us, and many of those countries are in NATO and they weren’t paying their bills,” Trump said.
He reiterated a criticism he made of Germany during a tense North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) summit in Brussels last week, namely that the country should not have agreed to the Nord Stream 2 pipeline project with Russia.
“Germany made a pipeline deal with Russia where they’re going to be paying Russia billions and billions of dollars a year for energy, and I say that’s not good, that’s not fair,” Trump said. “You’re supposed to be fighting for someone and then that someone gives billions of dollars to the one that you’re, you know, guarding against. I think it’s ridiculous, so I let that be known also this time.”
According to Trump, the pipeline deal has generated “a lot of anger” for Germany, and it won’t even be good for the country in the long run anyway.
“Are they waving a white flag?” he asked.
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