Trump Further Hurts our Relations with the European Union

Trump Further Hurts our Relations with the European Union May 19, 2018

Thursday, heads of the 28-nation member states of the European Union (EU) met and denounced U.S. President Donald Trump’s removal of the U.S. as a participant in the nuclear agreement with Iran, called the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA). The other participants in that agreement are the UK, France, Germany, EU, Russia, and China. The EU said it will stay in the agreement. During Trump’s campaign for president, the author of The Art of the Deal repeatedly said JCPOA was a terrible deal and that he would scrap it if elected president. So, he is merely doing what he said he would do. But in doing so, he is not only increasing the risk of nuclear war but merely cowtailing to Israel and certain Gulf nations in the Arab Middle East, who oppose Iran. Thus, Trump is widening the separation between Shiite and Sunni Arab nations.

The Trump administration says it will fully impose previous sanctions against Iran, even making them worse, and penalize any nation that acts against those sanctions. Therefore, the EU will continue to trade with Iran and likely suffer U.S. opposition.

So, an anti-Trump movement is surging through Europe, especially among its heads of state. Yet Trump has been president of the U.S. for only sixteen months. He earlier pulled the U.S. out of the Paris Climate Agreement because he rejects the idea of human-induced global warming, which I think is foolish. Trump rejects multi-alliances by pulling the U.S. out the Trans-Pacific Alliance (TPA), threatens to do so with NAPTA, and has started a global trade war by imposing tariffs, with emphasis on China.

Also Thursday, David Tusk–president of the European Council of the EU–condemned the “capricious assertiveness of the American administration.”

President Donald Trump is doing what I’ve been saying on this blog almost since he took office, that he is hurting U.S. foreign relations with our closest allies.


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