Trump vowed he’d ‘never’ help Europe if it’s attacked, top EU official says

BRUSSELS — One in all Europe’s most senior politicians recounted how former U.S. President Donald Trump privately warned that America wouldn’t come to the EU’s assist if it was attacked militarily.

“You’ll want to perceive that if Europe is underneath assault we are going to by no means come that will help you and to assist you,” Trump instructed European Fee President Ursula von der Leyen in 2020, based on French European Commissioner Thierry Breton, who was additionally current at a gathering on the World Financial Discussion board in Davos.

“By the best way, NATO is lifeless, and we are going to go away, we are going to give up NATO,” Trump additionally stated, based on Breton. “And he added, ‘and by the best way, you owe me $400 billion, since you didn’t pay, you Germans, what you needed to pay for protection,'” Breton stated concerning the tense assembly, the place the EU’s then-trade chief Phil Hogan was additionally current.

Breton instructed the anecdote at an occasion within the European Parliament in Brussels on Tuesday, simply days earlier than the Republican Occasion holds its January 15 caucus in Iowa, the opening contest in Trump’s bid to win the Republican nomination for a run at returning to the White Home. Occasion members will solid their votes for candidates together with Trump, Florida Governor Ron DeSantis and former South Carolina Governor Nikki Haley, who each path means behind the ex-president in opinion polls.

Brussels is rife with worry concerning the chance Trump will return to the U.S. presidency.

Because the commissioner in control of the EU’s industrial coverage and protection agenda, Breton has pushed for the EU to spice up its personal self-defense capabilities amid Russia’s struggle in Ukraine, and on Tuesday floated a €100 billion fund to ramp up arms manufacturing within the bloc.

“That was a giant wake-up name and he might come again,” Breton stated about Trump. “So now greater than ever, we all know that we’re on our personal, in fact. We’re a member of NATO, nearly all of us, in fact we now have allies, however we now have no different choices however to extend drastically this pillar so as to be prepared [for] no matter occurs.”