U.S. President Donald Trump called Norway’s Finance Minister Jens Stoltenberg out of the blue last month to discuss trade tariffs — as well as his bid to win the Nobel Peace Prize.
The call was first reported by Norwegian newspaper Dagens Næringsliv on Thursday and was later confirmed to POLITICO by a government official in Oslo. This was not the first time Trump had raised the prize in discussions with Stoltenberg, Dagens Næringsliv noted.
“It is true that President Trump called me a few days before his conversation with Prime Minister Støre. Several of the president’s staff members also participated in the conversation, including Treasury Secretary Bessent and Trade Representative Greer,” Stoltenberg, the former NATO secretary-general, told POLITICO in a comment.
“We discussed tariffs, economic cooperation, and it served as preparation for his call with Prime Minister Støre. I will not go into further detail about the content of the conversation,” he added.
Trump’s Friday meeting with Russian President Vladimir Putin in Alaska could prove to be the ultimate test for his Nobel Peace Prize case, as any breakthrough or misstep on the Ukraine conflict would likely affect his peacemaking credentials.
While oscillating on who’s to blame for the Russian full-scale invasion of Ukraine, Trump has appeared to harden his rhetorical position on Putin in recent months.
Every year, the Norwegian Nobel Committee selects laureates from hundreds of nominees. Its five members are appointed by Norway’s parliament in line with the instructions of 19th-century Swedish industrialist Alfred Nobel. Winners are announced each October in Oslo.
Several countries, including Israel, Pakistan and Cambodia, have already nominated Trump for brokering peace agreements or ceasefires since he returned to office in January.
Trump has claimed credit for cooling tensions between nuclear-armed India and Pakistan after skirmishes earlier this year, and last week hosted the leaders of Armenia and Azerbaijan in Washington to address ending decades of hostilities.
If he were to win, the real estate tycoon-turned-politician would become the fifth United States president to receive the prize, following Theodore Roosevelt, Woodrow Wilson, Jimmy Carter and Trump’s longtime rival Barack Obama.
“They will never give me a Nobel Peace Prize,” Trump complained during a February meeting with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu in the Oval Office. “It’s too bad. I deserve it, but they will never give it to me.”
During a press briefing on July 31, White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt argued that it’s “well past time” that Trump wins the top gong.
The White House did not immediately respond to POLITICO’s request for comment.
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