The European Parliament’s main political party is attempting to block US President Donald Trump’s expected choice for US ambassador to the European Union, calling the likely nominee “hostile and malevolent.”
A letter from the Group of the European People’s Party, or EPP, urges the EU to reject US businessman Ted Malloch as bloc leaders hold an informal summit Friday in Malta expected to focus on migration, NATO and Europe’s future.
The EU faces uncertainties as the UK moves to extricate itself from the union — Brexit — and hostility from the Trump administration.
In the letter to the presidents of the European Council and European Commission, the EPP calls the pro-Brexit Malloch “hostile and malevolent” and criticizes a “series of public statements” by the American “denigrating the EU.”
“In these statements, the prospective nominee expressed his ambitions ‘to tame the bloc like he brought down the Soviet Union,’ eloquently supported dissolution of the European Union and explicitly bet on the demise of the common currency within months,” it reads.
“If pronounced by an official representative of the United States, they would have the potential to undermine seriously the transatlantic relationship that has, for the past 70 years, essentially contributed to peace, stability and prosperity on our continent.
“We are strongly convinced that persons seeing as their mission to disrupt or dissolve the EU, should not be accredited as official representatives to the EU.”
The letter ends by urging EU leaders Donald Tusk and Jean-Claude Juncker not to accept Malloch should he be Trump’s pick.
European leaders have reacted angrily to the US leader’s perceived interference.
“(With) regards to our bilateral relationship with the US, they are well understood in Europe’s public opinion, but there is no future with Trump, if it’s not defined together,” French President François Hollande told reporters at the summit. “He has to understand that. Because what counts is the solidarity within the European Union.”
Anti-EU stance
Trump’s comments and actions have led these leaders to question his commitment to longstanding friendships, NATO and the EU itself.
On the campaign trail, Trump repeatedly questioned the value of NATO and suggested the United States was shouldering an outsize financial commitment to the alliance.
Following her trip last week to Washington, UK Prime Minister Theresa May will call on other members of the EU to increase their defense spending at the Malta summit.
May is expected to brief EU leaders on her US trip in which she received assurances that Trump is fully committed to NATO.
Brexit fan
Trump hasn’t made any secret of his support for Brexit and recently told The Times of London: “I think people want … their own identity, so if you ask me … I believe others will leave.”
Malloch told the BBC last week: “Mr. Trump has clearly said that any trade deals with anyone frankly in the future will be done on a bilateral basis.”
At the Malta summit, leaders of the other 27 EU nations will discuss Britain’s departure and the future of the bloc.
Britain edged closer to Brexit this week, with Parliament voting in favor of May triggering Article 50 of the Lisbon Treaty — the formal process of leaving the EU.
May wants to invoke Article 50 by the end of March, firing the starting gun on a two-year divorce wrangle.
The UK government has stressed it wants to see a strong and successful European Union after Brexit.
In Malta, May is already an outsider, invited to some meetings but not all. She won’t join the other EU leaders when they discuss recent comments by Tusk, the European Council president, calling Trump a “threat” to European order.