A White House spokesperson defended President Donald Trump’s handling of international relations, even as new details emerged about tensions that have strained America’s oldest partnerships. Spokesperson Anna Kelly said Trump “has effectively restored America’s standing on the world stage” and “has done more for NATO than anyone else.”
But behind those claims lies a more complicated picture. In February 2025, Trump hurled a tablet across the Oval Office during a multilateral call with world leaders after a technical glitch prevented him from speaking. French President Emmanuel Macron was visiting the White House at the time, and the two leaders had been using the device to join a call led by Canada’s then-prime minister, Justin Trudeau. An official who was present said Trump “lobbed the device over the Resolute Desk and onto the floor.”
European Leaders Walk on Eggshells
NATO Secretary General Mark Rutte has emerged as the central architect of Europe’s strategy to placate Trump, adopting the president’s communication style by using short, capitalized messages and urging other leaders to present defense spending increases as Trump’s personal achievement. Other European officials have privately joked about Rutte “as an actor who never broke character.”
Finland’s President Alexander Stubb and Norway’s Prime Minister Jonas Gahr Støre coordinated their messaging strategies, with Støre asking Stubb to send certain communications on Norway’s behalf because Trump has expressed frustration over not receiving the Nobel Peace Prize. European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen adjusted her public language on Russia policy after Trump pushed back on her calls to punish Moscow over Vladimir Putin’s war in Ukraine. Rather than using the word “sanctions,” she began describing the same measures as “tariffs.”
When German Chancellor Friedrich Merz visited Washington in June 2025, Trump showed him a space next to the Oval Office filled with campaign merchandise, including hats and boxes of shoes. Trump had given the room a nickname — the Lewinsky room — and encouraged his German guests to help themselves, joking that their wives could sell the items for thousands of dollars.
A Secret Summit in Brussels
The strain reached a dramatic peak in January 2026, when close to 30 European heads of government gathered for a tense midnight session in Brussels to discuss how the continent might reduce its security and economic reliance on the United States. The covert summit followed a period of mounting anxiety over Trump’s repeated suggestions that he might seek to wrest Greenland, an autonomous territory of NATO member Denmark, away by force.
British intelligence has reached a sobering conclusion about all this flattery: it is buying European governments less and less influence. Analysts are said to have compared the atmosphere around Trump’s White House to something between a medieval royal court and the Salem witch trials — an environment where favor is precarious and the rules shift without warning.
Chaos in the Middle East
The revelations about Trump’s behavior inside the Oval Office land against a turbulent international backdrop. In early June 2026, Trump publicly called on Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to stand down from further military action against Iran, only to be publicly defied when Netanyahu moved ahead with retaliatory strikes on Iran anyway. Trump, speaking from a tarmac in New York after attending an NBA finals game, insisted the situation was under control and that a deal could be finalized within days — even as the facts on the ground told a different story.
Iran fired missiles at commercial ships in the Strait of Hormuz late Monday, and the U.S. retaliated on July 7 with new strikes on Iranian targets and reimposed sanctions on Iranian oil exports, a U.S. official calling it “punishment” that “won’t be over for a bit.”
National Counterterrorism Center Director Joe Kent resigned in March 2026, claiming Trump had launched the war against Iran under pressure from Israel. The FBI has since opened an investigation into Kent over allegations that he leaked classified information, according to multiple reports citing administration officials.
Greenland Threats Return at NATO Summit
A NATO summit began on July 7 in Ankara, Turkey, where Trump renewed his Greenland threats and raised the possibility of drawing down U.S. troops in Europe — the latest flashpoint in the dependency anxiety that drove January’s Brussels summit. The tablet-throwing episode and other incidents paint a portrait of a U.S. president whose volatility has pushed Washington’s closest alliances toward breaking point, forcing foreign governments into elaborate and sometimes nearly comical efforts to remain in his good graces.
