'Terrible is to confuse diplomacy with thuggery': Spanish minister fires back after Trump's NATO jab

President Donald Trump courted fresh controversy after he railed against Spain, one of his NATO allies, on the sidelines of the NATO summit in Ankara, with NATO Secretary General Mark Rutte sitting next to him. Spain's Health Minister Mónica García was not having any of his insults, issuing a sharp retort on X: "Trump calls Spain a 'terrible partner' because it accepts neither blackmail nor threats. Because we are a sovereign, democratic country that defends multilateralism and peace. Terrible is to confuse diplomacy with thuggery."

García's comments come in the wake of Trump blasting Spain—and by extension NATO—for not supporting the country over Greenland and Iran. "They were unwilling to help us. But we didn't need help. But I was really testing. I wanted to see whether or not they'd be there. The answer is they were. I spoke to Germany, I spoke to France, spoke to U.K., I spoke to Italy. I didn't speak to Spain. Spain is a wasted cause," he told reporters.

The 80-year-old then elaborated on how he intends to punish Spain. "We don't want to do any trade business with Spain anymore, including visits. Spain is a terrible partner, and they don't participate; they don't pay. They'll come running back. They treat this man (Rutte) terribly. But Spain doesn't agree to anything. You shouldn't carry them. 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," he asserted.

Trump noted that a few countries were not pulling their weight in NATO but singled out Spain for its hostility. "They're hopeless. They make so much money with us, and we're going to see that they make a lot less." This is not the first time—it's the second—that Trump has threatened to halt commerce with Spain over its refusal to commit to NATO's new defense spending target of 5% of GDP. He threatened to cut trade in March, but trade between the two countries continued normally, according to Reuters.

Furthermore, Trump's trade threat is being widely reported as unenforceable in practice, since Spain's foreign trade is governed by EU-wide agreements, not by Madrid alone, so Trump's threats may ring hollow. When asked if he would renegotiate with the EU, Trump said he would see what happens in the future. "They've treated us very badly for years. The problem is they took advantage of the United States for years. We have the greatest economy we've ever had."

But the comments show how ties between the US and Europe—once considered America's most steady ally—are at an all-time low. The situation is so tense that European leaders gathered in a marathon meeting in January this year to discuss how to manage a breakup with America, The Wall Street Journal reported. Countries like France and the Netherlands are quietly removing American tech from their systems, and some are running studies on how well their American weaponry will work without Washington's authorization, it added.