Trump suggests expelling Spain from NATO because it is "falling behind"

US President Donald Trump has suggested that NATO consider expelling Spain from the alliance due to the country's low defense spending. He said this during a bilateral meeting with Finnish President Alexander Stubb.

"We had one country that was lagging behind – Spain. You have to call them and find out why they are lagging behind." .... They are doing well. They have no excuse for it, but that's okay. Maybe you should expel them from NATO, frankly," Trump told Stubb.

At the same time, he noted that Finland has increased military spending in response to Russia's full-scale invasion of Ukraine.

"You have done a great job with this. Spain has not," he told Stubb during the meeting.

In June, at the NATO summit, allies agreed to support Trump's demand to allocate 5% of GDP to defense spending, 3.5% to core military spending, and 1.5% to broader security-related investments. Spain was the only country that refused.

In response, Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez said that he considers his current defense spending of 2% of gross domestic product "sufficient.".

According to the Alliance, Spain is one of the NATO countries with the lowest defense spending, with less than 1.2% of GDP in 2023.

• on October 7, Polling Europe released polling data showing that support for increased defense spending in the European Union has declined.