Washington, D.C. – Today, House Armed Services Ranking Member Adam Smith (D-WA) released the following statement about President Trump’s actions toward U.S. allies and partners, and his remarks at the G-7 summit:

“As the G-7 summit begins in Quebec today, I am deeply disturbed at President Trump’s recent actions against our allies and partners. Just this morning, President Trump called for bringing Russia in to rejoin the G-7 even though President Putin continues to actively undermine democratic values while working to upend the international order. 

“This latest outreach to Putin comes on the heels of imposing tariffs on some of our closest allies in the name of supposed national security. Regardless of your views on international commerce, these national security based tariffs on our allies have clearly damaged the United States’ relationship with key partners. Moreover, this is just the most recent example of President Trump misusing ‘national security’ as justification to drive his own agenda. He has claimed ‘national security’ when imposing these tariffs on our allies, inappropriately bailing out failing coal plants, and imposing his discriminatory Muslim ban. Arguments about national security should not be misused in this way.

“The national security threats facing the United States are too vast to address on our own and these actions by President Trump only undermine our ability to work with allies and partners to meet our defense challenges.”

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