{"id":52341,"date":"2026-07-09T01:16:33","date_gmt":"2026-07-09T01:16:33","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/spain\/52341\/"},"modified":"2026-07-09T01:16:33","modified_gmt":"2026-07-09T01:16:33","slug":"trump-says-he-wants-to-cut-off-trade-with-spain-over-nato-spending-dispute","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/spain\/52341\/","title":{"rendered":"Trump says he wants to cut off trade with Spain over NATO spending dispute"},"content":{"rendered":"

President Trump said he wants to cut off trade with Spain and told Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent to halt business with the country, escalating a dispute over Spain\u2019s defense spending at NATO.<\/p>\n

Trump made the comments<\/a> Wednesday during a meeting with NATO Secretary-General Mark Rutte at the alliance summit in Ankara, Turkey, where he singled out Spain as a \u201cterrible partner\u201d and accused it of refusing to pay its share.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe don\u2019t want to do any trade business with Spain anymore,\u201d Trump said, turning to Bessent. \u201cI\u2019d like you to cut it out. Spain is a terrible partner in NATO. They don\u2019t participate. They don\u2019t pay. I don\u2019t want anything to do with Spain.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cCut off all trade with Spain, please, including visits,\u201d Trump added. \u201cWe don\u2019t want anything to do with them.\u201d<\/p>\n

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Trump said Spain was being \u201chostile\u201d about NATO spending and predicted it would eventually ask to restore trade with the United States. <\/p>\n

\u201cThey make so much money with us, and we\u2019re going to see that they make a lot less,\u201d he said. \u201cI want no business with them.\u201d<\/p>\n

It is the second time Trump has instructed Bessent to halt commerce with Spain over the NATO spending dispute, though trade between the two countries continued normally after a similar threat in March, according to Reuters<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Spanish Prime Minister Pedro S\u00e1nchez defended Spain after Trump\u2019s remarks, telling reporters after the summit that the country remains a reliable NATO ally.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe are a reliable country and we fulfill our commitments,\u201d S\u00e1nchez said.<\/p>\n

S\u00e1nchez said he had spoken briefly with Trump during the summit, but described it as an informal conversation about the World Cup.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt was an informal and colloquial conversation in which there was absolutely no tension,\u201d he said, adding that the exchange was marked by \u201cgood words and kindness.\u201d<\/p>\n

Reuters reported that Trump\u2019s frustration with Madrid has grown since S\u00e1nchez refused to let the United States use Spanish airspace or bases during the Iran war.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"President Trump said he wants to cut off trade with Spain and told Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent to…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":52342,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[305,17,26],"class_list":["post-52341","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-spain","tag-nato","tag-spain","tag-united-states"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/spain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/52341","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/spain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/spain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/spain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/spain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=52341"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/spain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/52341\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/spain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/52342"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/spain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=52341"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/spain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=52341"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/spain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=52341"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}