President Donald Trump was delighted with the head of NATO calling him “daddy” during a defense of Trump’s profanity-laced rant about Israel and Iran.
Speaking alongside Trump at the NATO summit in the Netherlands on Wednesday, NATO Secretary General Mark Rutte attempted to downplay Trump’s f-bomb outburst as he complained that Israel and Iran had violated his ceasefire.
Trump compared the warring countries to “two kids in a school yard” fighting. “They fight like hell. You can’t stop them. Let them fight for about two, three minutes. Then it’s easier to stop them,” Trump said at the summit on Wednesday morning.
“Then daddy has to sometimes use strong language,” Rutte added, referring to Trump’s comments the day before.
Later on Wednesday, a British reporter asked Trump about Rutte calling him “daddy” and if he thought of America’s NATO allies as children.
“No, he likes me,” Trump answered. “I think he likes me. If he doesn’t, I’ll let you know. I’ll come back and I’ll hit him hard, OK? He did it very [affectionately], ‘Daddy, you’re my daddy.’”
Just hours after announcing a ceasefire between Israel and Iran after 12 days of hostilities, Trump launched into an explosive tirade on Tuesday morning while accusing both sides of violating the truce.
“You basically have two countries that have been fighting so long and so hard that they don’t know what the f— they’re doing! Do you understand that?” he told reporters at the White House before departing for the NATO summit.
Rutte, a Dutch politician who succeeded Jens Stoltenberg as NATO’s Secretary General last year, has made no secret of his admiration for Trump’s approach to foreign policy.
Before speaking alongside Trump at the summit, Rutte was asked about Trump posting a gushing text message Rutte sent to the U.S. president on his Truth Social account. In the message, Rutte congratulated Trump on his strikes on nuclear facilities in Iran, calling the operation “extraordinary” and saying Trump had done “something no one else dared to do.”
When asked if he was embarrassed by the message being made public, Rutte said: “Absolutely not.”
“What is in that text message is a statement of fact, and I’m totally fine that he shared,” Rutte said.
In calling Trump “daddy,” Rutte echoed several MAGA diehards who have also taken to using the term to refer to their hero. Former Fox News host Tucker Carlson likened Trump to a “Dad” who would give a “vigorous spanking” to America—which he likened to a “bad little girl”—in a particularly chilling speech at a Trump rally last year.
Asked if it was “demeaning” for a NATO chief to refer to Trump as “daddy,” Rutte insisted that it wasn’t.
“No, I don’t think so,” Rutte said. “I think it’s a bit of a question of taste,” adding that Trump is a “good friend” who “deserves all the praise.”
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