{"id":538,"date":"2026-07-05T23:53:47","date_gmt":"2026-07-05T18:53:47","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/?p=538"},"modified":"2026-07-05T23:53:47","modified_gmt":"2026-07-05T18:53:47","slug":"trump-lashes-out-at-nato-as-rift-widens-ahead-of-summit","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/?p=538","title":{"rendered":"Trump Lashes Out at NATO as Rift Widens Ahead of Summit"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><script>\r\n  atOptions = {\r\n    'key' : '644b717812d811d6a1c1fc5b6ccd6fa6',\r\n    'format' : 'iframe',\r\n    'height' : 90,\r\n    'width' : 728,\r\n    'params' : {}\r\n  };\r\n<\/script>\r\n<script src=\"https:\/\/www.highperformanceformat.com\/644b717812d811d6a1c1fc5b6ccd6fa6\/invoke.js\"><\/script>\r\n<br \/>\n<\/p>\n<div data-testid=\"paragraph-content\">\n<div>\n<p data-testid=\"paragraph-element\" class=\"rich-text mb-6 font-graphik text-body-large text-black-coffee focus-visible:outline focus-visible:outline-black-coffee focus-visible:outline-2 focus-visible:outline-offset-2 focus-visible:shadow-focus-color text-left\">The President had earlier <a href=\"https:\/\/truthsocial.com\/@realDonaldTrump\/posts\/116850279579552155\" title=\"undefined\" target=\"undefined\">complained<\/a> that the U.S. \u201cspends more money on NATO than any other country, by far, to protect them, without getting any benefit.\u201d <\/p>\n<\/div>\n<div>\n<p data-testid=\"paragraph-element\" class=\"rich-text mb-6 font-graphik text-body-large text-black-coffee focus-visible:outline focus-visible:outline-black-coffee focus-visible:outline-2 focus-visible:outline-offset-2 focus-visible:shadow-focus-color text-left\">Seemingly citing figures from NATO\u2019s defence expenditure <a href=\"https:\/\/www.nato.int\/content\/dam\/nato\/webready\/documents\/finance\/def-exp-2025-en.pdf\" title=\"undefined\" target=\"undefined\">data<\/a> in 2025, he compared the \u201c$999 billion\u201d spent by the U.S. to the \u201c$44.3 billion\u201d put forward by Poland. [NATO&#8217;s 2025 estimate for U.S. spending is $980 billion.] \u201cOthers, including Germany, are much lower,\u201d Trump insisted.\u00a0<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<div>\n<p data-testid=\"paragraph-element\" class=\"rich-text mb-6 font-graphik text-body-large text-black-coffee focus-visible:outline focus-visible:outline-black-coffee focus-visible:outline-2 focus-visible:outline-offset-2 focus-visible:shadow-focus-color text-left\">German Chancellor Friedrich Merz on Friday defended his country\u2019s contributions.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<div>\n<p data-testid=\"paragraph-element\" class=\"rich-text mb-6 font-graphik text-body-large text-black-coffee focus-visible:outline focus-visible:outline-black-coffee focus-visible:outline-2 focus-visible:outline-offset-2 focus-visible:shadow-focus-color text-left\">&#8220;Germany is \u200bdoubling its defense budget within four years. This is the greatest \u2060effort we have ever made to strengthen our defense capabilities. In this respect, \u200bwe have no reason to shy away from anyone,&#8221; he told reporters.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<div>\n<p data-testid=\"paragraph-element\" class=\"rich-text mb-6 font-graphik text-body-large text-black-coffee focus-visible:outline focus-visible:outline-black-coffee focus-visible:outline-2 focus-visible:outline-offset-2 focus-visible:shadow-focus-color text-left\">&#8220;We will state \u200bthis, with all due modesty, and we are doing so as the European Union\u2019s largest member state, bearing a responsibility within Europe.&#8221;<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<div>\n<p data-testid=\"paragraph-element\" class=\"rich-text mb-6 font-graphik text-body-large text-black-coffee focus-visible:outline focus-visible:outline-black-coffee focus-visible:outline-2 focus-visible:outline-offset-2 focus-visible:shadow-focus-color text-left\">NATO defense spending has long been a contentious issue for Trump who has, since his first term, accused European allies of not investing enough in their own militaries and relying too heavily on U.S. contributions and protections.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<script async=\"async\" data-cfasync=\"false\" src=\"https:\/\/pl30214220.effectivecpmnetwork.com\/9ab3d4df8a7e1a6171e16ddbf732cc19\/invoke.js\"><\/script>\r\n<div id=\"container-9ab3d4df8a7e1a6171e16ddbf732cc19\"><\/div>\r\n\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The President had earlier complained that the U.S. \u201cspends more money on NATO than any other country, by far, to protect them, without getting any benefit.\u201d Seemingly citing figures from NATO\u2019s defence expenditure data in 2025, he compared the \u201c$999 billion\u201d spent by the U.S. to the \u201c$44.3 billion\u201d put forward by Poland. [NATO&#8217;s 2025&#8230;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":539,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"fifu_image_url":"https:\/\/static.time.com\/v3\/assets\/bltea6093859af6183b\/blt7e0b309b8b18f1bc\/6a47cd773ca03c33e604484a\/AP26175766628013.jpg?branch=production&width=3840&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9","fifu_image_alt":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-538","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-pics-news"],"brizy_media":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/538","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=538"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/538\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/539"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=538"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=538"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=538"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}