Trump said on Wednesday (June 25) he would negotiate directly with Spain on defence spending after the country’s refusal to meet a NATO defence spending target of 5% of gross domestic product.

He also said the United States will make Spain pay twice as much for a trade deal.

During a news conference on the sidelines of the NATO summit in the Hague, Trump called Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell "terrible" and said he knows three or four people who are contenders for the next chair of the Federal Reserve.

"I know within three or four people who I'm going to pick," Trump told reporters when asked if he is interviewing candidates to replace Powell.

Trump also commented on NATO Secretary General Mark Rutte's earlier remarks on Wednesday where he likened him to a "daddy" intervening in a schoolyard brawl after the U.S. leader used profanity when describing the war between Israel and Iran.

In comments to the press, Trump had compared fighting between Iran and Israel to children quarrelling.

Rutte laughed and added: "And then daddy has to sometimes use strong language to get (them to) stop."

DESCRIPCIÓN DE IMÁGENES

1. U.S. PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP DURING NEWS CONFERENCE

THE HAGUE, NETHERLANDS (JUNE 25, 2025) (REUTERS-Access All)

2. (SOUNDBITE) (English) U.S. PRESIDENT, DONALD TRUMP, SAYING:

" I think Spain's terrible what they've done. No I do, they're the only country that won't pay the full up. They want to stay at 2%. I think it's terrible. And, you know, they're doing very well. The economy is very well and that economy could be blown right out of the water with something bad happened. You know, Spain is the only country that. Are you from Spain? Yeah, but congratulations. You're the only country that is not paying. I don't know what the problem is. I think it's too bad. So we'll make it up. You what we're going to do? We're negotiating with Spain on a trade deal. We're going to make them pay twice as much and I'm actually serious about that."

THE HAGUE, NETHERLANDS (JUNE 25, 2025) (NATO-Access All)

3. TRUMP DURING NEWS CONFERENCE

THE HAGUE, NETHERLANDS (JUNE 25, 2025) (REUTERS-Access All)

4. (SOUNDBITE) (English) U.S. PRESIDENT, DONALD TRUMP, SAYING:

"I'm going to negotiate directly with Spain. I'm going to do it myself. They're going to pay, they'll pay more money this way. You should tell them to go back and pay - you're a reporter? Tell them to go back. They ought to join all of those countries that are paying 5%."

THE HAGUE, NETHERLANDS (JUNE 25, 2025) (NATO-Access All)

5. TRUMP DURING NEWS CONFERENCE

6. (SOUNDBITE) (English) U.S. PRESIDENT, DONALD TRUMP, SAYING:

"So let me just tell you they do want to have the anti-missile missiles okay as they call them the Patriots and we're going to see if we could make some available you know they're very hard to get. We need them to we would supplying them to Israel and they're very effective - 100% effective hard to believe how effective and they do want that more than any other thing as you probably know. It's very good question and I wish a lot of luck, I mean I can see it's very upsetting to you." / SHOT ENDS ON REPORTER

7. TRUMP DURING NEWS CONFERENCE

8. (SOUNDBITE) (English) U.S. PRESIDENT, DONALD TRUMP, SAYING:

"I know within three or four people who I'm going to pick - I mean he goes out pretty soon unfortunately because I think he's terrible. We have no inflation, we have a tremendous economy. Hundreds of billions of dollars of tariff money is pouring in, factories are being built because they don't want to pay the tariffs so they're building them all over the country."

9. NEWS CONFERENCE IN PROGRESS

10. (SOUNDBITE) (English) U.S. PRESIDENT, DONALD TRUMP, SAYING:

REPORTER ASKING (English): ""Rutte is your friend he called you Daddy earlier do you regard your NATO allies as kind of children?"

TRUMP SAYING: "No he likes me I think he likes me. If he doesn't I'll let you know, I'll come back and hit him hard ok"

11. NEWS CONFERENCE IN PROGRESS

12. TRUMP SAYING (English) "Thank you very much everybody." / TRUMP WALKING AWAY