Politics
Prominent GOP Senator Calls For U.S. To Exit NATO
Senator Mike Lee (R-UT) is calling for the United States to withdraw from the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) as several European nations continue to reject President Trump’s calls for peace in Ukraine.
In a series of X posts, Lee pointed to the lopsided U.S. investment in the alliance, lack of free speech in Europe and a desire from several European governments to escalate the War in Ukraine rather than back a peace treaty. “Get us out of NATO,” Lee said in response to statistics showing that more than 70 percent of NATO funding comes from the United States.
“It’s not us. It’s them,” Lee said in response to a post noting that several European countries, such as Germany and the U.K., have draconian “hate speech” laws under which citizens are jailed for innocuous political statements or opposition to mass third-world immigration. “Time to leave NATO,” Lee concluded.
Senator Lee’s calls to leave the alliance were echoed by U.S. Rep. Thomas Massie (R-KY). “NATO is a Cold War relic that needs to be relegated to a talking kiosk at the Smithsonian,” the congressman said in response to one of Lee’s posts.
When one commenter described NATO as the “strongest alliance we have or ever had” before saying the organization is far superior to the United Nations, Massie joked that, “Teats on a boar hog are more useful than the United Nations.”
Elon Musk has also endorsed the idea of a U.S. withdrawal from NATO and the United Nations. In an post on Saturday night, Musk endorsed a suggestion from user @GuntherEagleman, who wrote: “It’s time to leave NATO and the UN.”
The continued U.S. role in the alliance has come under intense scrutiny after Friday’s contentious Oval Office meeting between President Trump, Vice President Vance and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky. While Zelensky was widely expected to sign an economic agreement that would provide a percentage of the nations minerals sector to the U.S. as backpay for military aid in exchange for security guarantees, the meeting devolved into chaos when Zelensky suggested that the U.S. will “face pressure soon” if Trump refuses to escalate the war.
After determining that Zelensky’s remarks were disrespectful, Trump ended the meeting later told reporters that he is not committing to another meeting in the near future.
Over the weekend, Zelensky met with a number of European leaders who have been trashing President Trump and committing to increased military spending for Ukraine. Despite the tough talk, U.K. Prime Minister Keir Starmer agreed to commit just $2 billion in additional aid, a fraction of the $174.2 billion allocated for Ukraine funding by the U.S. legislature last year.
As tensions simmer between the U.S. and several European members of the alliance, NATO Secretary General Mark Rutte recently praised President Trump for calling on European nations to increase defense spending. “By now we are spending 700 billion more on the European side of NATO than before President Trump came into office. It is absolutely still not enough. We have to do much much more,” he said.
“But the good thing is now that we have a process in place by which we can exactly determine what the gaps are in terms of long-range missiles, in terms of our armies, in terms of our logistics, in terms of our military mobility, in terms of our air defense, and it will require a lot of a lot more money than we spent so far. We will come to conclusions towards summer on this, but I can hear now from my European colleagues that they are willing to step up also when it comes now to Ukraine, helping with the peace deal, but also when it comes to spending more on defense,” Rutte continued, adding that it is only “fair.”
