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| - Days after President-elect Donald Trump's 2024 election win, a quote purportedly by North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) chief Mark Rutte about America's position on Russia's war in Ukraine spread on social media. According to the posts, the secretary-general said in response to Trump's victory, "If Trump surrenders Ukraine to Putin, I will personally expel the United States from the alliance."
(X user @JDunlap1974)
The quote, which circulated without any credible sources to substantiate it,
However, there was no real evidence of Rutte making the statement, which would have generated news headlines if he had actually said it. The quote was fabricated. A NATO spokesperson said the claim was "bogus."
As secretary-general, Rutte does not have the authority to "personally expel" a country from the alliance. While he leads the alliance, according to NATO's website, "authority for taking decisions is invested only in the member governments themselves."
Furthermore, the alleged quote did not align with real public comments by Rutte about Trump's 2024 presidential win. On Nov. 6, Rutte released a statement congratulating him and Vice President-elect JD Vance and praising Trump's past leadership:
I congratulate Donald Trump on his election as President of the United States.
I look forward to working with him again to advance peace through strength through NATO.
Through NATO, the US has 31 friends and Allies who help to advance US interests, multiply American power and keep Americans safe.
Together, NATO Allies represent half of the world's economic might and half of the world's military might.
We face a growing number of challenges globally, from a more aggressive Russia, to terrorism, to strategic competition with China, as well the increasing alignment of China, Russia, North Korea and Iran.
Working together through NATO helps to deter aggression, protect our collective security, and support our economies.
President-elect Trump demonstrated strong U.S. leadership throughout his first term in office – a term that turned the tide on European defence spending, improved transatlantic burden sharing, and strengthened Alliance capabilities.
Rutte also
The next day, Nov. 7, Rutte discussed with journalists the f
First of all, of course, I want to congratulate again, President Trump, upon his re-election. It was really a huge success for him, including capturing the House and the Senate. I look forward to work with him again. When he was president he was the one in NATO who stimulated us to move over the 2% and now also thanks to him, in NATO, if you take out the numbers of the US for a moment, is above the 2% and I think very much that is his doing, his success, and we need to do more. We know this today.
Today on my mind in this meeting is what is happening now with North Koreans being deployed in Russia. And what we see more and more is that North Korea, Iran, China and of course, Russia are working together, working together against Ukraine, but at the same time, Russia has to pay for this, and one of the things they are doing is delivering technology to North Korea, which is now threatening the future the mainland of the US, continental Europe, but also our partners in Indo, Pacific, Japan, for example, and Republic of Korea. So these are really dangerous new developments, and we need to discuss that today.
But I also look forward to sit down with President Trump and to navigate how collectively we'll make sure that we face this threat and that we keep our part of the world safe.
During his presidential campaign, Trump repeatedly claimed he could quickly end the war in Ukraine but did not offer details on how, The Associated Press reported. He has also been critical of the amount of aid the United States has sent to the country, and at one point, he
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