{"id":1064,"date":"2018-06-10T21:06:15","date_gmt":"2018-06-11T01:06:15","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.gopplaybook.com\/?p=1064"},"modified":"2018-06-10T21:06:15","modified_gmt":"2018-06-11T01:06:15","slug":"escalating-clash-with-canada-trump-is-isolated-before-north-korea-meeting","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.gopplaybook.com\/?p=1064","title":{"rendered":"Escalating Clash With Canada, Trump Is Isolated Before North Korea Meeting"},"content":{"rendered":"
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By\u00a0Peter Baker<\/a>,\u00a0<\/span>June 10, 2018<\/p>\n

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President Trump \u201cis not going to let a Canadian prime minister push him around,\u201d said his top economic adviser, Larry Kudlow, left, after the president left early from a tense G-7 summit in Canada.<\/span>Credit<\/span>Doug Mills\/The New York Times<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/header>\n
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WASHINGTON \u2014 President Trump escalated a bitter clash with some of America\u2019s closest allies on Sunday, lashing out through his advisers at Canada\u2019s prime minister in unusually personal terms and leaving himself with a diplomatic crisis as he arrived in Asia to negotiate a nuclear agreement with North Korea.<\/p>\n

A day after Mr. Trump refused to sign a communiqu\u00e9 of the\u00a0Group of 7<\/a>major industrial economies, his advisers went on the attack, accusing Prime Minister Justin Trudeau of \u201cbetrayal\u201d and a \u201cstab\u201d in the back, even as Canada, Germany and France pushed back against what they called the American president\u2019s \u201cinsult\u201d and \u201cinconsistency.\u201d<\/p>\n

The exchange left Mr. Trump estranged from America\u2019s partners at the very moment he is about to stride onto the most important world stage he has assumed since taking office. Aides attributed his outburst over the weekend to his feeling undercut as he prepared to\u00a0meet with the North Korean leader, Kim Jong-un<\/a>, while critics said he had stiff-armed his friends at the expense of a unified front.<\/p>\n

Whether Mr. Kim sees Mr. Trump\u2019s combative approach as a sign of strength or weakness, the rupture with other major powers was sure to shadow the session between the two in Singapore on Tuesday, the first time leaders of the United States and North Korea will have met in person. Mr. Trump\u2019s strategy for pressuring Mr. Kim to give up his nuclear weapons has depended on isolating North Korea, but he arrived in Singapore looking isolated himself.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

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\u201cI\u2019ve never seen anything like this,\u201d said Robert D. Hormats, who advised Republican and Democratic presidents at a dozen Group of 7 summit meetings, starting at the first in Rambouillet, France, in 1975, when it was still the Group of 6. \u201cThe irony is this institution that was designed largely by the United States was really designed to shore up alliances and political relationships and resolve economic issues. This just served to do the opposite of that.\u201d<\/p>\n

The latest meeting, held in Canada, was tense amid disputes over trade, security and other issues. But after negotiators for all seven countries crafted a final communiqu\u00e9 that even the reluctant American delegation agreed to, Mr. Trump abruptly\u00a0lashed out on Twitter<\/a>\u00a0from Air Force One on Saturday night.<\/p>\n

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\u00a0He refused to sign the communiqu\u00e9, blaming Mr. Trudeau for making \u201cfalse statements\u201d at an end-of-summit news conference, and called the Canadian leader \u201c<\/span>dishonest & weak<\/a>.\u201d<\/span><\/div>\n<\/div>\n

By Sunday morning, Mr. Trump\u2019s aides were adding fire to the attack on Mr. Trudeau. Larry Kudlow, the president\u2019s economic adviser, said Mr. Trudeau\u2019s comments were \u201ca betrayal\u201d and that he had \u201cstabbed us in the back.\u201d Mr. Trump \u201cis not going to let a Canadian prime minister push him around,\u201d Mr. Kudlow said on\u00a0CNN\u2019s \u201cState of the Union\u201d program<\/a>, adding, \u201cHe is not going to permit any show of weakness on the trip to negotiate with North Korea.\u201d<\/p>\n

Peter Navarro, the president\u2019s trade adviser, was even harsher. \u201cThere\u2019s a special place in hell for any foreign leader that engages in bad-faith diplomacy with President Donald J. Trump and then tries to stab him in the back on the way out the door,\u201d Mr. Navarro\u00a0said on \u201cFox News Sunday.\u201d<\/a><\/p>\n<\/div>\n