How Trump’s NATO ambassador pick may bring ‘pressure tactics’ to alliance

Experts see Trump's choice of Matt Whitaker, a lawyer with no foreign policy or diplomacy experience, as a sign Trump will pursue hardline tactics.

President-elect Donald Trump’s choice of his former acting attorney general Matt Whitaker to serve as U.S. ambassador to NATO likely signals a confrontational and “bullying” approach toward the military alliance he has long railed against, analysts say.

That could present both vulnerabilities and opportunities for Canada, which has been under increased pressure to meet its defence spending commitments, those experts add. That pressure is expected to build further under a new Trump administration, whose representative to NATO is a relative newcomer to the diplomatic scene fully aligned with his president’s worldview.

“Appointing a loyalist with limited foreign policy experience and expertise might signal an intention (by Trump) to keep pushing his more confrontational and unilateral agenda,” Erika Simpson, an associate professor of international relations at Western University, told Global News in an email.

If Whitaker is confirmed, Simpson said he may bring “more hardline rhetoric, pressure tactics, America First tactics that strain the alliance’s norms of consensus and cooperation.”

In a social media post after Trump’s announcement Wednesday, Whitaker said he “look(s) forward to strengthening relationships with our NATO Allies and standing firm in the face of threats to Peace and Stability.”

Whitaker is a former U.S. attorney in Iowa and served as acting attorney general between November 2018 and February 2019 as special counsel Robert Mueller’s investigation into Russian election interference was drawing to a close. He had been chief of staff to Trump’s first attorney general, Jeff Sessions, before being picked to replace his boss after Sessions was fired over his decision to recuse himself from the Russia investigation.

Whitaker has since been a vocal critic of the U.S. Justice Department he once led, particularly in defending Trump against the four criminal indictments against him. He has little foreign policy or national security experience, making him a relative unknown to many in U.S. security circles.

His nomination as NATO ambassador will still need to be confirmed by the U.S. Senate. If approved, it will break a precedent under previous presidents of ambassadors with years of diplomatic, political or military credentials.