White House: President Trump Participates in a Greeting with the Secretary General of NATO

Thank you very much. We've had some great meetings. We had dinner last night with President Erdoğan, and I think it was really— I would rate it a 10, maybe a 12. A bit of a small palace, the White House. Everything is beautiful.

We've had some very big meetings, in particular with Turkey and trade. And now we're meeting with everybody today, as you know. We're going to have a very big meeting with Lots of leaders from, I think, every country, right? Every country showed up. They're all there.

Plus, we have a couple that aren't in NATO that would like to be in NATO. But it's been very successful. It's been a fantastic meeting. So I'll be having a news conference after we're finished at about 4:30, 5 o'clock. And I assume most of you will attend.

But a lot of things have been determined and some things haven't, frankly. We have— attacked very powerfully last night. The very dangerous people from Iran, they're sick. There's something wrong with them. We said, go and do your funeral stuff.

And instead of that, they start shooting rockets at ships yesterday. And so we hit them very hard last night. Very hard. I would say 20 to 1. 20 Times tougher.

They call them— every time you hit, we hit. And of course, they're dirty players, so they go after everyone, probably including me. I've been number one on their list for years, and they're a bunch of scum. You want to know that? They're scum.

And, uh, so we don't like them. I don't like them, and they're evil people. And it's the denuclearization of Iran And we're going to denuke it. We're not going to let them because they're crazy and they can't have a nuclear weapon. And they go around killing people.

They've killed thousands and thousands of our soldiers. They've killed hundreds of thousands of innocent people. They had me roadside bomb Soleimani. I took care of him first term. And that was a big thing because I think he probably would be a lot stronger had he been around because He was a bad guy, but he was an evil genius, but a bad guy.

And he was the father of the roadside bomb. The roadside bomb is a bomb that goes on when you're driving your little vehicle around and it goes on and you have no legs, no arms, and no face. And they've killed thousands and thousands of people. Even the SS Cole was theirs. You remember that disaster.

So, uh, I don't like them at all. And frankly, I think we waste a lot of time with them. I think we should— I think we should just do our business. Can you imagine? They start shooting bombs, actually missiles at ships yesterday.

Saudi Arabia and Kuwait, a couple of others.

And they don't know— I don't think— I don't think they know what the hell they're doing. But they're bad people. Very bad people. I think they're incompetent, by the way, because if they were competent, they would have made a deal a long time ago. Like, how about 47 years ago?

So they've been trouble for 47 years. And there we took out their first set of leaders. We took out their second set of leaders. They want to take out the U.S. leader. Me, I'm on every list.

I saw a link this morning. I'm on every single one of their lists. And so far, I guess I've been a little bit lucky, but that maybe doesn't last very long because that's the way it goes. But we have great people. But these are evil, sick people, and we have to rid their cancer— their cancer.

And you know what you do? You got to cut out cancer early. And that's the way I feel. And I want to thank Mark. He's been a great Secretary General of NATO.

I'm not happy with NATO because of what they did with Greenland. And I'm not happy with NATO because of the fact that they didn't want to help us with the number one state sponsor of terror. That's Iran. They were unwilling to help us. Now, in all fairness, I didn't speak to Mark about it.

I think if I did, it might have been different, but we didn't need help. But I was really testing. I wanted to see whether or not they'd be there. And the answer is they were. I spoke to Germany.

I spoke to France. Spoke to— UK, spoke to Italy. I spoke to— I didn't speak to Spain. Spain is a wasted cause. We don't want to do any trade business with Spain anymore, by the way.

I'd like you to cut it out. Spain is a terrible partner in NATO. They don't participate. They don't pay. I don't want anything to do with Spain.

Cut off all trade with Spain, please, including visits. Okay, we don't want anything to do. Watch them, watch them come running back. Oh, they'll come running back. They treat this man terribly.

And this man's a good man too. Great man. They're lucky to have him. But Spain doesn't agree to anything. And you shouldn't carry him.

I mean, you sort of automatically carry because you're protecting an area. So they're there. So they probably figured they have to protect us, right? But we don't have to. We don't have to trade with them.

I don't want to do any more trade with them. All right? Take it immediately. Don't even talk to them. They're hopeless.

Bad people. Because, you know, they have everybody else going and paying and working. In Spain, in particular Spain, there are a couple of others, but in particular Spain, they're open about it. They're hostile about it. And let's see how hostile they remain when they call up and they, please, please, we want to trade with you, sir.

We want to trade with you, sir. They make so much money with us, and we're going to see that they make a lot less. I want no business with them. So other than that, we're having the big meeting in a little while, and I'm going to relate my problems. Greenland is a big problem for us.

And the other big problem is the fact that when we wanted them, we didn't want them badly, but we did say, if you want to join us, and they all said no. But when they could have, they weren't there for us. And we've been there for them. We spent over $1 trillion over the last short period, trillion, in order to protect these countries from Russia. And has nothing to do with us.

We have an ocean, but it's been a long-term thing and they haven't treated us right. And Mark understands that. He understands that. And we're going to work something out, I think, one way way or the other. But we've been treated unfairly.

We pay disproportionately. We had a time when we were paying 100%. We were paying 100% of NATO, and yet a lot of the countries weren't paying anything. But there was calls made a few weeks ago. I spoke with the UK, and the Prime Minister said, well, we don't want to help you now, but we'll help you when the war is over.

I said, that's not good. And likewise, I spoke to Germany. They didn't want to help. I spoke to France. They didn't want to help.

Nobody wanted to help. Some of the very small countries wanted to help because they're the most vulnerable. I mean, that's the only reason they wanted to help. So I appreciate you being here. We're going to be going back together, many of us together.

And again, I want to say, despite the fact that I'm very upset with NATO, that we pay far, far too much, billions and billions of dollars too much. Because it's unfair. Because we're protecting them. So we protect them, but they're not there for us. Think of it.

It doesn't work. But I want to say, this is a great leader. They're lucky to have him. It's a very— it's their biggest asset, if you want to know the truth. So, Mark, would you say a few words?

Absolutely. And thank you so much, Mr. President. Dear Donald, let me start with Iran. We discussed it last night at the Presidential Palace. I think what you did, degrading the nuclear capability crucial for Israel, the region, for Europe, degrading the ballistic missile capability of Iran crucial for Israel, for the region, for you, for the whole world, and then trying to bring this to a peaceful end.

They attacking ships yesterday. I think what you did last night was absolutely necessary. It was a very strong response and I'm with you on this. It's really important. When it comes to NATO, what you have achieved, and this is a huge win, and I just want to say this again, the last 2 years, Canada and European NATO nations spending $215 billion more in 2024 and 2025 and 2026 compared to 2024.

This is staggering. $258 In the meantime, almost 200,000 jobs in the U.S. being supported by all the investments by countries in the United States in the defense industry base, buying from the defense industry base from the U.S. companies. So here you see there is a— you have been able to really get them to step up, to do this. And when it comes to Iran, I know you are disappointed. We discussed it a couple of weeks ago.

I would say these are isolated cases. Planes taking off from European airports in support of Epic Fury. It was Europe as one big platform of power projection for the United States, helping with Epic Fury, including countries you mentioned— Germany from day one, France, and many others. We discussed the Bucharest airport, which was closed for a couple of days for commercial traffic because they— you needed it for Epic Fury. And the United Kingdom wouldn't let us use the island.

For 2 weeks, so we had a flight back. No, no, sir, I'm saying you're right, or actually—. And Italy was very bad having to do with their bases, as you know, and a couple of others. So it was—. But still, generally, 5,000 is huge.

And you mentioned Spain. Even you got Spain to pay 2%. They spent— they made a huge step in last year. So there's still issues we have to solve, but hey, also even Spain, I would say they got to the 2%. And I know you have a very strong relationship with, you know, Meredith King, the King, but also you personally always with Geert Staalman, who is now leaving office.

He has now also committed to spend another $20 billion extra, £50 billion on defense. So I would argue without you in this chair, this would not have happened. It is of course because of Russia, but also because of you. So grab to win, it's there. You did this.

It was Dean Hague and now they are implementing. And on Greenland, you and I made a deal in Davos. I will make sure that that deal is step by step being implemented. That you can deploy, if you want, the Golden Dawn Agreement. You have your trilateral talks.

Marko is leading them from your side with the Greenlanders and the Danes. And it comes to if they will change their constitutional position in the kingdom, et cetera. But hey—. Can we just say that Greenland is very important for the United States, but it's not important for Denmark. In fact, when Denmark was overrun by the Nazis, in less than one day.

Hitler beat them out in one day, took over. They asked us to take care of Greenland. In fact, we took Greenland and then stupidly we gave it back. We shouldn't have given it back to them because we're the ones that need it. We need it for protection of the world, not just the United States.

And it's very important. It doesn't help Denmark, but it helps us. And it's very important for us. And again, they were defeated very quickly. Denmark was beaten in one day.

Taken over in one day, less than one day, by the Nazis, by Hitler. And when this happened, they immediately switched it over to us. We owned it. We had it. We were taking care of it.

And then we gave it back, which is— I don't know why. I wouldn't have given the Panama Canal back either. So what do I know? I certainly wouldn't have done that because China is trying to take over the Panama Canal. And that's not going to happen.

So, but I just, you know, it's interesting. I'm very unhappy with NATO. This man is a great leader and he gets it. He gets it, gets it maybe better than some of the leaders. But also, your allies get it, thanks to you.

That is important. I could not do this without you. It's too bad Biden didn't do it, or Obama. Hey, but you are here now. Obama.

And you're entering $45 billion, entering $47 billion. In total, more than $1.2 trillion. I call this the Trump trillion. Yeah, it's true. $1.2 Trillion extra spent by Canada and the—.

And I'm not always blaming NATO. They're getting a— they got a free ride. And if Biden had any brain, which he didn't, he would have said, you got to pay more. And same with Obama. Two bad presidents.

But they could have asked, and he would have done that too. It would have been— I mean, who knows? Who knows if they would have gotten it? It should have happened years ago, and it couldn't. But Obama didn't do it, and Biden didn't do it.

Frankly, Bush didn't do it either. But you did what Eisenhower started trying to do, equalizing people. He tried. Yeah, Eisenhower tried. And all the other presidents, none of them were successful.

You're the first one. It's your win. Your win in the Hague. That's why I like him. And the win now.

This is true. Without you, this would not have happened. Really, gratitude. Do you have any questions? Mr. President, on Iran, is the ceasefire over?

Is the ceasefire done? Is the MOU dead? It's a very interesting question. To me, I think it's over. I don't want to deal with them anymore.

They're scum. You know what scum is? They're scum. They're sick people. They're led by sick people.

And they're vicious, violent people. And if they had a nuclear weapon, they'd use it. As far as I'm concerned, it's over. I'll speak to our negotiators. They want to negotiate.

They're good people. Steve Witkoff, Jared Kushner. But they have to come back to me. As far as I'm concerned, it's just a waste of time dealing with them. They're liars.

We make a deal and they— what if I make a deal with him? We have a deal and he goes out, he talks. We make a deal. Everyone's agreed. No nuclear weapon.

We make a deal. They go outside, talk to the press. They say we never even talked about it. There's something wrong with them. They're cuckoo.

As far as I'm concerned, it's over. So are we back at war? Talks won't resume after we get through the funeral proceedings. What? Does this mean that talks with Iran will not resume?

I don't care. They can talk, but I think they're wasting their time. They're a bunch of lying guys. I do it my whole life. That's all I do is deals.

My whole life is— that's how I became president, I guess. That's a deal too, right? But I made a lot of money. I had a lot of great success. Tremendous success.

Everything I did, I was successful. And I deal with these guys and they say, this is from a different school. They're liars. They're cheats. They're sick people.

They've hurt their people. They killed 54,000 people as of now that were protesting. You know, when people say, how come they haven't taken over? They can't take over because they're dead. They killed them.

Nobody's going to take over. They have no guns and the other side has machine guns and they're killing them. The press doesn't report it. But they're bad people. They're bad people.

And frankly, I don't want to waste my time with them. Now, I'll let our wonderful negotiators keep talking if they want, but I don't see it. I don't like these people. You know that? I like him.

I like the leaders. I like— I think all of these leaders—. Great. And they love—. I think they didn't treat the United States fairly for many years, but that's okay.

But But they're sane, rational, good people. Most of them. I don't like a couple of them, to be honest. Forget a couple I don't like much. But I like Erdoğan.

I'll tell you, I like President Erdoğan. He rolled out the red carpet. He's terrific. You know, he could have gone into the war. A lot of people saying, like with Bibi, I like Bibi.

Bibi is a terrific wartime prime minister. But Bibi said rough things yesterday about Turkey. Erdogan. And I said, you know, I spoke to him. I said, he could have gone into the war because he doesn't like Israel much and he doesn't like Bibi much.

And he didn't go because of me. And this is a military power. Millions of soldiers. Turkey is very strong. They have a lot of our best equipment.

They're trying to get the F-35s. But he didn't go in. He wanted it. He would go in. If it weren't for me, he would have gone in.

And he would have been on the other side, even though I don't think he likes the other side either, because he happens to be very sane and they happen to be very crazy. But so I think, you know, they treated us right. I think China treated us right. I was with President Xi and I said, I hope you're not going to go into the war because we don't want that. You know, he gets 50% of his oil from the Strait of Hormuz and he gets more than 50%.

And he never went into the war. He didn't supply them equipment. Yeah, he was great. Big fan of President Xi. A lot of people say, oh, why?

You know, I watched a couple of people critical of the fact that TikTok, TikTok is so bad. It's so dangerous. It's so horrible. They're spreading all these rumors. And the numbers came out yesterday.

You know who's number one on TikTok? I am. I'm number one on TikTok. And all I talk about is how bad communism is. China is, right?

They say, oh, it's terrible. They're spreading. But I'm number one. I listen to Gordon Chang. I like Gordon Chang, but he's always like negative.

Oh, China is so terrible. They're so terrible. And TikTok is so terrible. But I'm number one on TikTok. I had like 4 billion views or something like that.

So I don't know. People have to get their priorities straight.

We have had a really good day. We're going to have another good half a day, and then I'll see you later. We'll talk to you. Thank you very much. Thank you.