Can a president pull out of NATO without Congress approval?

No, a U.S. President cannot unilaterally pull out of NATO without Congress approval. Legislation passed in 2023 (Section 1250A of the FY2024 NDAA) explicitly prohibits the president from suspending, terminating, or withdrawing from NATO unless approved by a two-thirds vote in the Senate or via an Act of Congress.

AT least NOT MY pres drumpf / trump is proficient at one thing, and that seems to be proving to the world he does not have one redeeming quality. Honestly, I can not think of one. His recent attacks on NATO the organization and NATO countries, their citizens, their leaders, is fueled by drumpf's / trump's narcissism, greed, ignorance, bigotry, racism, hate and penchant for violence. He can not accept that NATO is not just another of his possessions subject to his evil whims and desires. Here's to NATO, it's member states, it's member militaries, it's united leadership and it's hundreds of millions of residents who are committed to defending and strengthening freedom and democracy. Keep up the good fight and continue to keep NOT MY pres drumpf / trump and his neo-nazi fascist administration in their place! From the New York Times.....

Trump Again Hits Out at NATO Over Iran War

President Trump lashed out after hosting Mark Rutte, NATO’s secretary general, at the White House on Wednesday.

By Steven Erlanger and Christopher F. Schuetze

Steven Erlanger reports on NATO and European security. Christopher F. Schuetze reported from Berlin.

April 9, 2026

President Trump has hit out at NATO after a tense meeting with Mark Rutte, the secretary general of the military alliance, at the White House on Wednesday.

Mr. Rutte had traveled to Washington to try to assuage Mr. Trump’s anger that NATO members had refused to participate in the U.S.-Israeli war in Iran and help open up the Strait of Hormuz, a vital oil and gas shipping route. But Mr. Rutte conceded that it was not an easy meeting, calling it “very frank” and “very open,” despite clear disagreements.

Mr. Trump, who has also complained that the alliance has refused to hand over Greenland, a semiautonomous territory of NATO member Denmark, to the United States, was not satisfied.

“NATO WASN’T THERE WHEN WE NEEDED THEM, AND THEY WON’T BE THERE IF WE NEED THEM AGAIN,” he wrote on social media after the meeting. “REMEMBER GREENLAND, THAT BIG, POORLY RUN, PIECE OF ICE!!!”

Mr. Trump did not say that he was pulling the United States out of NATO, however, which was a topic to be discussed during the meeting, the White House said.

Karoline Leavitt, the White House press secretary, on Wednesday quoted Mr. Trump as saying that NATO was “tested and they failed.” NATO countries, she added, had “turned their backs on the American people” who help fund their defense.

Mr. Rutte said on CNN that he reminded Mr. Trump that many NATO allies, including Britain, had allowed American forces to use their bases, even if some tried to distinguish between American missions that were “defensive” or “offensive.”

“He is clearly disappointed with many NATO allies, and I can see his point,” Mr. Rutte said. “But at the same time, I was also able to point to the fact that the large majority of European nations has been helpful with basing, with logistics, with overflights, with making sure that they live up to the commitments.”

He added: “It’s, therefore, a nuanced picture.”

Pressed on whether Mr. Trump threatened to quit NATO, Mr. Rutte said only: “It was a very open discussion. He clearly told me what he thought of what happened over the last couple of weeks.”

Mr. Rutte has been called the “Trump whisperer” for his mix of public flattery and private advice to the president. But his approach has been criticized by some NATO states, especially for supporting Mr. Trump’s decision to launch a war with Iran that many members of the alliance view as unnecessary and illegal under international law.

Chancellor Friedrich Merz of Germany, who spoke with Mr. Trump on Wednesday, said that he did not want the war in Iran to put further pressure on the alliance.

Germany would help “stabilize” peace once the conflict ended, he told reporters on Thursday in Berlin. “We want to ensure that this war, which has become a trans-Atlantic stress test, does not further strain the relations between the United States and European NATO partners,” he said.

Steven Erlanger is the chief diplomatic correspondent in Europe and is based in Berlin. He has reported from over 120 countries, including Thailand, France, Israel, Germany and the former Soviet Union.

Christopher F. Schuetze is a reporter for The Times based in Berlin, covering politics, society and culture in Germany, Austria and Switzerland.

NATO Labors to Avoid Beco

ming Another Casualty of the Iran War

President Trump is citing the unwillingness of European nations to back the United States in the conflict as another reason to scale back or abandon the alliance. And he still wants Greenland.

By Anton Troianovski

Reporting from Washington

April 9, 2026

Mark Rutte, the secretary general of NATO, described his tense meeting with President Trump this week as a “conversation” that “was really between friends.”

Mr. Trump, in a social media post on Thursday, put it slightly differently: “our own, very disappointing, NATO” does not understand “anything unless they have pressure placed upon them!!!”

Even as it has violently upended the Middle East and put intense strains on the global economy, the war in Iran has deepened the gulf between Mr. Trump and America’s NATO allies. That is after those countries spent more than a year buffeted by the president’s threats, begun in his first term, to abandon the alliance.

Mr. Trump is training his anger at NATO as his cease-fire with Iran hangs in the balance and even some of his supporters question whether the United States really achieved its objectives. He is airing his discontent over his inability to take over Greenland, despite behind-the-scenes talks over the Danish island that the White House says are going well. And he is forcing European leaders yet again to try to keep him from abandoning them, even as their countries struggle to shoulder the economic costs of the U.S. war with Iran.

“We have, sometimes, the political home front to take care of,” Mr. Rutte said onstage at the Ronald Reagan Institute in Washington on Thursday, in a diplomatically phrased reminder that the war was deeply unpopular in Europe. “NATO is there, of course, to protect the Europeans, but also to protect the United States.”

Mr. Rutte, a former prime minister of the Netherlands, was making the point that the U.S. military benefits from its bases in Europe and, despite the tensions, has used them as staging sites for the war on Iran. But widening cracks in the alliance show that even if negotiators succeed in making a deal in the talks that start Saturday for a more permanent end to the war, the scars are likely to be lasting.

The Iran war “has become a trans-Atlantic stress test,” Chancellor Friedrich Merz of Germany said on Thursday, after acknowledging that his country was “massively suffering” from the energy market disruptions caused by the war. “We do not want — I do not want — a split within NATO.”

Mr. Trump’s disdain for the alliance dates back decades, underpinned by his conviction that Europeans have been freeloading off the American security umbrella. His latest fury stems from U.S. allies’ refusal to embrace his decision to join Israel in assaulting Iran, with Britain and Spain setting limits on the United States’ ability to use bases on their territory.

Mr. Trump escalated his threats against NATO even as he prepared to wind down the war — and despite the fact that he did not try to build a coalition with European countries before the bombing started. He told The Telegraph last week that he may pull out of the alliance entirely. In a news conference on Monday, a day before the cease-fire, Mr. Trump volunteered that he still sought control of Greenland, the semiautonomous Danish territory in the North Atlantic.

“It all began with, if you want to know the truth, Greenland,” Mr. Trump said after voicing his dissatisfaction with Europe’s lack of support for the Iran war. “We want Greenland. They don’t want to give it to us.”

He reinforced the point Wednesday, posting on social media in all capitals that “NATO wasn’t there when we needed them” and that Greenland was a “big, poorly run, piece of ice!!!”

Mr. Trump’s pivot back to Greenland was striking given that he said in January that he and Mr. Rutte had formed a “great” framework for a future deal over the island. Three-way talks between officials from Greenland, Denmark and the United States have continued since. There is no indication that those talks would grant control of Greenland to the United States, but a White House official said the administration was optimistic about the course of the talks.

In years past, many of Mr. Trump’s allies in Washington tried to rein in his attacks on NATO, seeking to remind him of the power that the United States gains from being able to base troops and warplanes in Europe. But in recent weeks, many of the war’s supporters in the United States have joined Mr. Trump in piling on against NATO, especially given the president’s frustration over Iran’s control of the Strait of Hormuz.

Sean Hannity, the Fox News host close to the president, said on his show Wednesday night that Europe was “a dying continent” and mused that “I’m not sure it’s worth going forward with NATO as we go on.”

Jack Keane, a retired general whom Mr. Trump awarded a Presidential Medal of Freedom in 2020, told Mr. Hannity that he did not think the president would pull out of NATO because “there is still value” in the alliance, but he predicted there would be consequences.

“I wouldn’t be surprised if we didn’t decide to move some of our troops out of Western European countries and move them into Eastern Europe countries,” General Keane said. “I think we’ll likely do something.”

The Wall Street Journal reported on Wednesday that Mr. Trump was considering moving U.S. troops stationed in Europe from countries seen as unhelpful in the war effort to ones seen as supportive, like Poland and Romania. The White House did not comment on the report, but a senior U.S. military official in Europe said that options were being reviewed.

Mr. Trump has threatened NATO many times, only to largely preserve the status quo. In the president’s latest outburst, some analysts also see a familiar inclination to attack a weaker party, especially given Mr. Trump’s inability to compel Iran to surrender after five weeks of bombardment.

“Beating up on Europe and NATO has really no domestic cost,” said Jeremy Shapiro, a former State Department official who is the research director of the European Council on Foreign Relations. “It’s quite typical for Trump: When things are going wrong, he finds the weakest person in the room and blames them.”

Eric Schmitt contributed reporting from Washington, and Christopher F. Schuetze from Berlin.

Anton Troianovski writes about American foreign policy and national security for The Times from Washington. He was previously a foreign correspondent based in Moscow and Berlin.

A version of this article appears in print on April 11, 2026, Section A, Page 10 of the New York edition with the headline: War in Iran Is Widening the Gap Between Trump and NATO Allies.

11 April 2026