President Donald Trump is going on offense against America’s partners in NATO.

The Commander in Chief, “stung by allies who haven’t been keen to fight another war in the Middle East,” as The Daily Beast reports, is pulling military assets vital to Europe’s protection — and vital to U.S. interests — out of Europe. Among them, a significant number of bombers, warships, fighter jets, refueling aircraft, submarines, destroyers, and roughly 5,000 troops.

The Daily Beast calls the moves “Snubbed Trump’s Petty Revenge Plot.”

While it would take an act of Congress to withdraw from NATO itself, withdrawing military assets is entirely up to the discretion of the Commander in Chief and the Secretary of Defense.

The president has become “incensed by European allies’ refusal to back his war in Iran, Der Spiegel reported,” The Daily Beast noted.

Trump, a strong critic of NATO for years, has, along with Secretary of State Marco Rubio, become “increasingly critical” of NATO, its refusal to assist U.S. efforts in the Iran war, and what he sees as NATO member countries’ refusal to spend sufficiently on their militaries and defense.

“Key members such as Spain and Italy incensed the president, 79, by closing their airspace and air bases to U.S. military aircraft taking part in the bombardment of Iran,” The Daily Beast noted. “That followed tension created by Trump’s repeated musings about seizing control of Greenland, which belongs to NATO member Denmark.”

Secretary Rubio told Fox News that the “problem with NATO, unfortunately—and I’ve been a supporter of NATO throughout my career in the Senate—and one of the reasons I supported NATO is it gave us basing rights.”

He explained that those rights gave the U.S. a “contingency” for when flying to areas like the Middle East. European bases can offer U.S. forces staging and refueling areas.

“And so, when you have NATO partners denying you the use of those bases, when the primary reason that NATO is good for America is now being denied to us by Spain, as an example, then what’s the purpose of the alliance?” Rubio asked.

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From President Donald Trump’s billion-dollar ballroom project to his $1.8 billion “slush fund,” to the 2020 election, Republicans who are finding their congressional careers at an end — in large part thanks to Trump — are “finally speaking up” about the leader of their party, says columnist Will Saletan at The Bulwark.

Senator Thom Tillis of North Carolina, who chose not to run for re-election last June after being targeted by Trump, has been among the most outspoken.

Tillis last week blasted the president’s ballroom, declaring that Americans were “trying to put food on the kitchen table. And now we’re talking about hundreds of millions of dollars for a ballroom?”

Senator Bill Cassidy, who lost his primary after Trump endorsed his opponent, called the ballroom “a spit-in-the-eye insult to all my taxpayers in Louisiana—to spend a billion dollars on a ballroom when we should be doing something about the high price of gas, groceries, and health care.”

Rep. Thomas Massie of Kentucky, also losing to a Trump endorsee, called the ballroom “an egregious waste of money” and a “slap in the face of Americans.”

READ MORE: Trump’s Board of Peace Fund ‘Empty’ as Countries Fail to Pay Up: Reports

Tillis denounced the president’s remarks after Trump said that he doesn’t think about Americans’ financial situation amid a challenging economy.

“A billionaire saying he doesn’t worry about what people are dealing with that grew up in trailer parks like I did, that’s not very wise,” warned Tillis.

Saletan notes, “Some of the exiles sound angrier about the slush fund Trump has set up to pay off people who claim to be victims of ‘weaponization’ by the Department of Justice.”

“If you’re going to create a fund, it has to be voted on by Congress. The president can’t do this by executive authority,” Massie said.

“It’s as if somebody sued themselves, agreed upon a settlement with themselves, and that’s going to be funded by the rest of us,” Cassidy argued. “There is no legal precedent for this.”

“A lot of thugs that should still be in prison,” Tillis said, for crimes surrounding January 6, 2021, “are eligible for this payout. Your dollars, my dollars.”

“When you take money from me to give to a purpose that I vehemently disagree with, that’s tyranny,” Tillis warned. “And that’s what that account is.”

During his concession speech, Cassidy declared: “You don’t claim the election was stolen” when you lose.

Tillis also took a broad swipe at Trump.

“Earlier this week, I was called a RINO by the president,” he told CNN. “And I will tell you, if the Republican party stands for standing with insurrectionists who assaulted police officers, turning a blind eye towards Putin and what he’s doing in Russia, negotiating a deal [in Iran] that may be subpar to the Obama deal, then don’t call me that Republican. Just call me a conservative.”

Saletan called Tillis’ remarks “a straightforward case, based on the longstanding principles of the political right, for leaving the party of Trump.”

READ MORE: GOP Senators Finally Admit the Truth About Trump’s War — Kristol Warns Damage Is Done

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President Donald Trump launched his Board of Peace in January, amid criticism that he intended to rival the United Nations, but months later — despite billions of dollars in pledges from donor countries — its fund “has received no money from donors,” according to the Financial Times, which reports “Donald Trump’s Board of Peace fund is empty.”

“Nobody with money and resources wants to work with the Board of Peace,” a person familiar with the group’s efforts told The Guardian. “Lump on the conflict with Iran, and the people with deep pockets now have an excuse not to pay.”

“Several countries that pledged billions of dollars have not actually given any money,” The Daily Beast adds, noting that it “has no real funding despite receiving billions of dollars in pledges.”

“Zero dollars have been deposited,” into the Board of Peace’s World Bank-backed fund, a source told the FT, The Daily Beast reports.

Even President Trump’s own State Department, which pledged $1.2 billion, has yet to disburse those funds, which it says are earmarked for projects linked to the Board of Peace.

“None of that money [has gone to the board]. None of that money is being managed by the Board of Peace. And State tells us there’s no intent to have any of that money managed by the Board of Peace,” a senior congressional aide told the FT.

No funds have gone toward rebuilding Gaza.

“Nothing has happened. They haven’t even contracted to remove rubble,” one person told The Guardian.

Still, one official said the Board of Peace is confident it can collect on pledges made, and said Morocco, Bahrain and the United Arab Emirates have all transferred money to support the group’s overhead costs.

Even the $10 billion Trump pledged at the Board’s first meeting in February has not been sent.

“We will help Gaza,” Trump said, as NBC News reported at the time. “We will straighten it out. We will make it successful. We will make it peaceful. And we will do things like that in other spots.”

“Once this board is completely formed,” Trump said at the January launch, “we can do pretty much whatever we want to do. And we’ll do it in conjunction with the United Nations,” Reuters reported. “There’s tremendous potential with the United Nations, and I think the combination of the Board of Peace with the kind of people we have here … could be something very, very unique for the world.”

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