The decision was immediately met with widespread backlash. The G7, an organization representing the world’s most developed economies, meets annually.
Trump later reluctantly changed the location to Camp David, though he maintained that the Emoluments Clause of the Constitution that prohibits Presidents from personally profiting from their office is “phony.”
Trump gave no elaboration as to how the clause from the Constitution that he has sworn to uphold is phony. The clause, from Article I, Section 9 of the Constitution reads,
No Title of Nobility shall be granted by the United States: And no Person holding any Office of Profit or Trust under them, shall, without the Consent of the Congress, accept of any present, Emolument, Office, or Title, of any kind whatever, from any King, Prince or foreign State.
The claim was part of a larger statement that that evokes the infamous “having nuclear” speech. In it, Trump said no other President gave up his salary and boasted about his prowess at real estate and his financials, despite never having released tax returns as promised. He complained about Obama’s book and Netflix deals and claimed that being President has already cost him $2 to $5 billion dollars.
He then launched into a deviation about rallies that echoed other remarks on setting greater records than Elton John, attacked Nancy Pelosi and Chuck Schumer, and claimed that Obama failed to solve the North Korea problem because of a lack of respect, unlike what they had for Trump and he had for them.
Trump discussed counter terrorism operations in Syria with two Russian officials that he met with in the Oval Office the day after firing FBI Director James Comey, which he claimed would ease pressure from the Russia investigation. Russia’s ally in the region, Iran, is a longtime enemy of Israel, and funds the terrorist organization Hezbollah. The CIA was so concerned with security leaks that they later withdrew a high level informant from the Russian government.
Trump also told the officials that he was unconcerned with Russian interference in US elections.
Trump said, “this is the biggest there is. This is the worst ever. Osama bin Laden was big, but Osama bin Laden became big with the World Trade Center. This is a man who built a whole, as he would like to call it, a country.” He went on to repeat a past claim that he had warned of bin Laden a year before his attack on the World Trade Center, but never received due credit.
Trump defended the unusual decision to avoid telling any Congressional leaders about the raid by claiming that Washington DC too frequently leaks important information. Trump had repeatedly leaked sensitive information, including on spy satellites, covert operatives, and the methods used in this very raid on al-Baghdadi.
Some of the remarks Trump made about the raid had been classified, while others seemed too fantastical to be true. Trump said of the raid that the ISIS leader “died like a dog,” having been “whimpering and crying and screaming all the way,” though Department of Defense officials said it was made up, as the feed of the raid had no audio.
Trump and his regular unsecured discussions with Russian officials led him to be considered such a massive security risk to any intelligence operations in Russia. After Trump gave classified intelligence to Russians about Israeli counter-terrorism operations, there was mounting concern in the intelligence community about a CIA operative inside the Russian government. The information was withdrawn from Russia in 2017, despite having been in place for decades passing on information to the US government.
Duterte had become infamous for his use of extrajudicial killings against those perceived as drug users and sellers, as well as against journalists and political enemies. He has bragged about murdering people himself, and compared himself favorably to Hitler. The State Department estimated at the time that there had been over 6,000 executions of suspected drug dealers with little regard for due process.
In a released transcript of a phone call between Trump and Duterte, Trump offered praise for Duterte’s “unbelievable job on the drug problem.” He also shared information on American nuclear submarines in the vicinity of North Korea, a significant security risk.
During a 2017 visit to the Philippines, Trump boasted of his “great relationship” with Duterte. During that same visit, Duterte sang a song dedicated to the US President.
Trump referred to his Secretary Defense Mark Esper as Esperanto. He repeated false claims that US soldiers being withdrawn from Syria were coming home when they were actually redeployed to Iraq, and that some kind of source of oil had been secured without any further explanation. The tweet has since been deleted.
The ISIS fighters had managed to escape from Kurdish prisons in the wake of Turkey’s offensive against them. Turkey began offensive operations after Trump unilaterally removed all US forces in the region. Trump appeared unconcerned about European or Kurdish allies.
