Alwaght- Trade-war monger Donald Trump blamed the EU for being "as bad as China" in its in its trade policies, arguing that the US is paying a fortune “protecting” the 28-member block.
Trump who appeared on Fox News’s Sunday Morning Futures to defended his America First policy, and said “The European Union is possibly as bad as China, just smaller. It’s terrible what they do to us”.
“I love those countries, Germany, and all of the countries. Scotland. ... But they treat us very badly. They treat us very unfairly,” he added, noting that "my parents were born in the European Union."
"I can say it better in a different way. They made, last year, $151bn in trade surplus. We had a deficit with the EU. On top of that, we spend a fortune on NATO to protect them,” he added.
Last year the US had a $101 billion trade deficit with the European Union. In comparison, the trade gap with China last year totaled $336 billion.
The president has attracted widespread criticism from Republicans, Democrats and international leaders over his decision to enact steep tariffs on imports of steel, aluminum and other products from the European Union, Canada, Mexico, China, India and other countries.
The move deeply offended and angered US allies, who failed to negotiate exemptions and had to resort to tit-for-tat retaliatory measures.
After the EU introduced duties on US goods worth €2.8bn, targeting products such as motorcycles, whiskey and orange juice, Trump reiterated his readiness to target the European automotive sector in the next round of the trade war.
"Take a look at the car situation, they send their Mercedes in, we can’t send our cars in. Look what they do to our farmers? They don't want our farm products,” Trump told Fox. “In all fairness, they have their farmers, so they want to protect their farmers. But we don’t protect ours and they protect theirs."
Touching on the EU, Trump the bloc is “hanging in there” but that the Brexit vote could upset that. “We’ll see what happens after Brexit,” Mr Trump said.
His words come after it was revealed that Mr Trump is said to have told French president Emmanuel Macron to pull out of the EU for a “better trade deal” with the US. The suggestion came at a meeting in April, according to The Washington Post, quoting two French officials. Beyond tariffs, Mr Trump repeated a claim that the US “spends a fortune” on Nato to “protect” Europe. The president has called on EU allies to up their defence spending because he says it is “unfair” the United States pays so much.
Mr Trump also warned that having pulled the US out of of the Iran nuclear deal, which was signed with a number of European and world powers, Washington would not be afraid of sanctioning European companies that do business with Tehran.
