President Trump’s slap at French President Emmanuel Macron during today’s NATO summit for his “nasty” suggestion that the alliance is faltering is a continuation of the American’s view that the Frenchman can be a pill.
In a relationship that the media has built up with the help of the president’s team, Trump actually isn’t a big fan and seems to distrust Macron’s politics.
In the new and authorized biography, Inside Trump’s White House: The Real Story of His Presidency, New York Times best-selling author Doug Wead revealed Trump’s impression of the French leader during a question-and-answer session for the book.
Wead quoted key officials describing the relationship as good as they described the April 2018 State visit of Macron and his wife Brigitte.
During the visit, Macron hoped to get Trump to reverse his plans to junk the Paris climate accords, the Obama-era deal with Iran, and the Trans-Pacific Partnership.
Noting Macron’s focus on big issues and his relationship with Trump, a key official said, “Macron has the potential to be a great leader for Europe.”
But, Wead continued, “Trump made it clear that he was unimpressed with his French counterpart. I asked him how he would describe Macron. And he answered with one word: ‘Deceitful.’”
Later today, Wead told Washington Secrets that in the transcript of the interview, Trump actually said, “He is a deceitful little guy.”
Trump’s criticism at the NATO summit today came after Macron had called the alliance’s strategy “brain dead.”
Said Trump, “I think that’s very insulting,” and he added that it was a “very, very nasty statement.”
But by the afternoon and at a late meeting at No. 10 Downing St., the air had cleared, and Trump not only complimented France but gave the French president a ride to the British prime minister’s residence.
