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Donald Trump has hinted he could walk away from supporting Ukraine as he doubled down on his administration’s recent criticism of Europe, describing it as “weak” and “decaying” and claiming it was “destroying itself” through immigration.
In a rambling and sometimes incoherent interview with Politico, a transcript of which was released on Tuesday, the US president struggled to name any other Ukrainian cities except for Kyiv, misrepresented elements of the trajectory of the conflict, and recycled far-right tropes about European immigration that echoed the “great replacement” conspiracy theory.
Trump called for Ukraine’s president, Volodymyr Zelenskyy, to accept his proposal to cede territory to Russia, arguing that Moscow retained the “upper hand” and that Zelenskyy’s government must “play ball”.
In his often halting remarks, Trump swerved from subject to subject while rehearsing familiar grudges and conspiracies. He also declined repeatedly to rule out sending American troops into Venezuela as part of his effort to bring down President Nicolás Maduro.
“I don’t want to rule in or out. I don’t talk about it,” Trump said, adding he did not want to talk about military strategy.
The US president returned repeatedly describing what he said were Europe’s problems in entirely racial terms, calling some unnamed European leaders “real stupid”.
“If it keeps going the way it’s going, Europe will not be … in my opinion … many of those countries will not be viable countries any longer. Their immigration policy is a disaster. What they’re doing with immigration is a disaster. We had a disaster coming, but I was able to stop it.”
The interview followed the release last week of a new US national security strategy that claimed Europe faced “civilisational erasure” because of mass migration and offered tacit support for far-right parties.
On Monda,y António Costa, the president of the European Council, said the signal that Washington would back Europe’s nationalist parties was unacceptable, adding: “What we cannot accept is the threat to interfere in European politics.”
Commenting on changes he said were occurring in big European cities such as London and Paris, Trump made clear that the problem as he viewed it was that they were becoming less white. He again singled out for criticism Sadiq Khan, London’s first Muslim mayor.
“And Europe is … if you take a look at Paris, it’s a much different place. I loved Paris. It’s a much different place than it was. If you take a look at London, you have a mayor named Khan.
“He’s a horrible mayor. He’s an incompetent mayor, but he’s a horrible, vicious, disgusting mayor. I think he’s done a terrible job. London’s a different place. I love London. I love London. And I hate to see it happen. You know, my roots are in Europe, as you know.“
[In] Europe, they’re coming in from all parts of the world. Not just the Middle East, they’re coming in from the Congo, tremendous numbers of people coming from the Congo. And even worse, they’re coming from prisons of the Congo and many other countries.”
Asked if the trajectory of European countries meant they would no longer be US allies, Trump replied: “Or they’ll be … well, it depends. You know, it depends. They’ll change their ideology, obviously, because the people coming in have a totally different ideology. But it’s gonna make them much weaker. They’ll be a much ... they’ll be much weaker, and they’ll be much different.”
While he denied he had a specific vision for Europe, Trump agreed he had “endorsed people that a lot of Europeans don’t like”, including Hungary’s Viktor Orbán.
“I have no vision for Europe. All I want to see is a strong Europe. Look, I have a vision for the United States of America first. It’s “Make America Great Again,” he said, adding: “I’m supposed to be a very smart person, I can … I have eyes. I have ears. I have knowledge. I have vast knowledge. I see what’s happening. I get reports that you will never see. And I think it’s horrible what’s happening to Europe.”
