Trump Orders Treasury Secretary To Cut Off All Trade With Spain For Second Time This Year, Resolving Long-Standing Concern That His First Such Order Had Taken Effect
ANKARA, Turkey. Interrupting a NATO summit convened specifically to project unity among the alliance's members, President Donald Trump on Wednesday instructed Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent to sever all commerce between the United States and Spain, resolving long-standing concerns that a founding partner of the Atlantic alliance was still permitted to sell Americans olive oil.
"Cut off all trade with Spain, please, including visits," Trump told Bessent in front of assembled reporters, describing the country of roughly 48 million people as "a wasted cause" and "a terrible partner in NATO" that, in his account, does not participate and does not pay. The order followed Spain's refusal to commit to spending 5 percent of its economic output on defense by 2035, a target the alliance's other members had accepted.
It marked the second occasion this year on which the President had directed Bessent to halt all commerce with Spain, the first having come in March. In the intervening months, according to reporting, trade between the two countries continued precisely as before, an outcome the administration appeared to treat as further justification for issuing a second, identical order.
Because Spain conducts its trade as one member of the 27-nation European Union rather than as a country a single American cabinet secretary can individually boycott, the mechanism by which the fourth-largest economy in that bloc would be cut off was not specified. The White House released no timeline, no list of affected goods, and no explanation of how "visits" would be halted.
A source within the administration said the President considered the matter of allied cohesion settled and had moved on, telling reporters moments later that the summit had shown "a lot of unity," a remark he delivered shortly after announcing that he wanted nothing further to do with one of its participants.
At press time, Spanish wine, olive oil, and pork were continuing to arrive at American ports on schedule, awaiting the President's third order.