McConnell joins Democrats to defend US NATO membership
Sen. Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) joined Democratic lawmakers in supporting the U.S.’s membership in NATO, after President Trump said he was considering withdrawing from the alliance.
“NATO is the most successful military alliance in history. It has underpinned the security of the United States for more than 70 years,” McConnell said in a joint statement with Sen. Chris Coons (D-Del.) on Wednesday.
The U.S. is one of NATO’s 12 original founding members, having signed the agreement in 1949. Trump told The Telegraph in an interview published Wednesday that the U.S.’s exit from the alliance is “beyond reconsideration.”
“I was never swayed by NATO,” he told the outlet. “I always knew they were a paper tiger, and [Russian President Vladimir] Putin knows that too, by the way.”
The president has previously criticized the alliance for its reluctance to support the U.S.’s ongoing military operations against Iran, labeling the members “cowards.”
“They didn’t want to join the fight to stop a Nuclear Powered Iran,” Trump wrote in a Truth Social post last month. “Now that fight is Militarily WON, with very little danger for them.”
McConnell is the chair, and Coons is the ranking member, of the Senate Appropriations Subcommittee on Defense.
“Alliance disputes are as old as the alliance itself,” the lawmakers wrote. “Americans are safer when NATO is strong and united. It is in our interest for all allies to tend this unity with care.”
Sen. Mark Warner (D-Va.), the vice chair of the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence, similarly defended the U.S.’s NATO membership Wednesday.
“For more than seventy years, NATO has been the cornerstone of American national security – deterring war in Europe, projecting strength around the world, and ensuring that the United States never stands alone in moments of crisis,” he wrote in a Wednesday statement.
“It is not a ‘paper tiger’ – it is the most successful military alliance in modern history, and Donald Trump’s threat to pull the United States out of NATO is reckless, dangerous, and plays directly into the hands of our adversaries.”
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