Category: Washington Post

BRUSSELS, Belgium — When NATO foreign ministers gathered this week to deliberate on a U.S. plan to end the war in Ukraine, they had neither the plan in hand nor Secretary of State Marco Rubio in the room to represent the alliance’s biggest, most powerful member. Rubio skipped the meeting as the White House held talks with Russia and Ukraine that have kept European allies sidelined.

The State Department did not give a reason for Rubio’s absence, but his decision not to attend the high-profile meeting only added to the quiet frustration among his European counterparts as President Donald Trump’s envoy Steve Witkoff and son-in-law Jared Kushner visited Moscow to discuss a plan with huge ramifications for European security.

It was here at NATO’s glassy headquarters that Trump rattled America’s partners during his first presidency by telling them that if they didn’t pull their weight, he could “do his own thing.” Now Washington appears to be doing just that, and not only in the Russia talks. In the Middle East, the Caribbean, the South Caucasus and pretty much everywhere else, Trump acts first, consults after — if at all.

In their plan for Ukraine, the president and his advisers have even seemed to position the United States as speaking not for the alliance — synonymous with American military might since its founding in 1949 — but as an independent arbiter, whose interests do not necessarily coincide with those of the 31 other allies, from Canada to Estonia.

“The spirit of the plan was: We are no longer an ally, we are a broker. We are not in this camp or that one, we are above that. It was perceived as a catastrophe by the Europeans,” said Claudia Major, a senior vice president of the German Marshall Fund, a Washington-based think tank.

“They don’t have to leave NATO to weaken NATO,” she said. “I mean, I’m a member of a gym but I don’t go.”

NATO Secretary General Mark Rutte, whose core job responsibility often seems to be to smooth over relations between Trump and other allies, told reporters there was nothing to worry about. The White House is “absolutely consulting enough” with European allies and he is “in constant contact” with U.S. officials, Rutte said as he convened the foreign ministers meeting Wednesday.

But Trump’s approach repeatedly has left European leaders in the dark, relying on leaks and news reports for the latest developments, then scrambling from afar to shape policy discussions in which their constituents and their continent have a far more direct stake.

Ahead of Witkoff’s trip, several diplomats at NATO said they weren’t sure which version of the plan he was taking to the Kremlin — an updated proposal reflecting changes from talks with Ukrainian negotiators, or something else.

European leaders are anxious and distrustful of the Trump administration. According to the leaked transcript of a phone call among leaders, published on Thursday by Der Spiegel, German Chancellor Friedrich Merz said that the Americans are “playing games” while French President Emmanuel Macron warned that Washington might “betray” Ukraine.

American exceptionalism — including unilateral decision-making and military action — is nothing new. But for Europeans, it now hits closer to home. After supporting the U.S. in many conflicts, including by sending troops to Afghanistan and Iraq, some allies feel bitterly slighted by Trump’s limited regard for their priorities.

European leaders were already alarmed by Trump’s interest in renewing economic ties with Russia, along with the president’s uncertain commitment to Europe’s security.

In an earlier bid to end the war, Trump invited Russian President Vladimir Putin to Alaska and seemed open to Russia’s demands for Ukrainian territory, prompting several European leaders to race to the White House for a meeting.

Last month, Witkoff floated a plan for Ukraine that many European officials found out about in the press. The proposal triggered alarm not only for the concessions it demanded of Kyiv but also because it mentioned using Russian frozen assets held in Europe, as well as restricting NATO expansion and the European Union’s ability to accept Ukraine as a member.

The initial, 28-point plan appeared to get revised after meetings between U.S. and Ukrainian negotiators. European diplomats expressed relief that it was revamped and said they had received U.S. assurances that NATO and EU questions would be addressed separately.

But Trump’s constant freelancing has cut to the heart of European apprehension that Washington does not share their dark assessment of Putin’s ultimate intentions, which they see as undermining European democracies and weakening NATO.

The negotiations also feed a fear that Trump shares with Putin a vision of the world in which Washington and Moscow get to decide the fate of others.

“You have this idea behind it that the great powers decide, and the smaller ones have limited sovereignty, and they are informed afterward,” Major said. “There is a certain intellectual dissonance,” she added, in the U.S. wanting to potentially do business with Russia while most NATO leaders describe Russia as their biggest threat.

Still, some European diplomats say the only option in the immediate term is to keep getting in Trump’s ear — because even if he were willing to consult more, Putin is not.

“The fact of life is the only ones capable of negotiating an end to the Ukraine war are the U.S., for the simple reason that Putin will not sit at the table with anyone else,” said a NATO diplomat, who, like others, spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss sensitive security issues. “This causes a lot of discomfort for many Europeans, but it is a fact of life, so as long as the Americans listen to us.”

“I think it’s fair to say these are the most consequential negotiations for European security of this century,” the diplomat added.

At this week’s NATO meeting, the United States was represented by Deputy Secretary of State Christopher Landau — who earlier this year questioned the need for NATO, calling it “a solution in search of a problem” in a post on X that he later deleted.

A State Department official, speaking on the condition of anonymity to discuss Rubio’s travel, said NATO was “completely revitalized” since Trump secured a European pledge to increase national defense spending by allies. Rubio has “already attended dozens of meetings with NATO allies, and it would be completely impractical to expect him at every meeting,” the official said.

NATO foreign ministers typically meet two times per year, with ambassadors stationed in Brussels meeting far more frequently.

“I totally accept him not being able to be here,” Rutte said of Rubio, who is juggling multiple jobs in the administration. Rutte also told reporters that he hears from “all allies that they’re completely committed” to NATO’s political doctrine that Russia poses the biggest threat to the Western alliance.

Several European diplomats acknowledge privately, however, that they encounter conflicting messages among those in Trump’s circle — seeing Rubio, for example, as more aligned with their ideas and Witkoff as too close to Moscow.

The Kremlin regularly criticizes input from European officials on the negotiations, casting them as warmongers seeking to perpetuate the conflict with their backing of Ukraine.

Putin declared this week that Russia is ready for war with Europe “right now if Europe starts it,” drawing consternation from European ministers, who said this was proof that they should funnel more money to Ukraine and their own militaries.

The increasingly tense rhetoric is fueling European calls to take charge at NATO in case the U.S. shrinks its dominant role, including in the command structure and quick-response plans.

European leaders must “adjust to a new reality” in which U.S. interests don’t necessarily match theirs, said Giuseppe Spatafora, an analyst at the EU’s Institute for Security Studies and a former NATO policy adviser.

“This opinion is becoming more popular among European leaders,” as the leaked phone call suggested, Spatafora said. “They thought that relentless engagement would avoid the worst outcomes, which it did, or could have slowly shifted Trump’s needle. I don’t think the latter happened.”

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, meanwhile, is dealing with a major corruption scandal that prompted the resignation of his chief of staff, and his negotiating leverage remains precarious. That’s especially because of a disagreement among EU nations on how to find fresh cash for Kyiv, now that the U.S. has halted direct cash assistance.

An EU plan to tap into some $200 billion in frozen Russian assets has run into stiff opposition from Belgium, where most of the funds are located.

Estonian Foreign Minister Margus Tsahkna said there was “very important momentum” in the U.S.-led talks, but he acknowledged early Wednesday, the morning after the American delegation went to the Kremlin: “We don’t know exactly what was discussed, and what will be the results.”

Rebecca Kelly Slaughter was a powerful — but low-profile — bureaucrat when a New York Times news alert popped up on her phone blasting to the world her firing by President Donald Trump. The Democratic member of the Federal Trade Commission had found out only minutes earlier.

Her phone began blowing up as she stood outside her daughter’s school during a rehearsal of Beauty and the Beast Jr. Slaughter, who mostly avoided the media, was soon participating in an impromptu news conference on her phone as the musical carried on inside.

When her daughter stepped offstage, Slaughter pushed through a crowd so she could be the first to spill the news to the girl. The fifth grader burst into tears before asking, “Are you going to fight back?”

“Probably,” Slaughter replied.

Thrust into the spotlight in March, a regulator more comfortable with the minutiae of antitrust issues than the dynamics of a political fight, has emerged as one of the primary opponents of Trump’s war on the federal workforce he disparages as the “deep state.”

Slaughter has not only fought her own dismissal in court, she has defended the work of civil servants before Congress, on podcasts and on TV, speaking out when many others are demoralized from losing jobs and absorbing the president’s repeated attacks.

On Monday, the Supreme Court will hear arguments in her case — which probably will be the first in which the justices render a final decision on the legality of Trump’s moves to fire agency heads and gut agencies.

Many legal experts expect the court to rule against Slaughter — a majority of the justices have signaled support for much of Trump’s argument. The stakes are high: The case could upend how the federal government has been run for nearly a century. A ruling against her could give the president greater control over some two-dozen independent agencies, a major goal in his quest to enlarge his power.

The administration says presidential control will make agencies such as the Federal Trade Commission, Federal Election Commission and Federal Communications Commission more accountable to voters who elect presidents. Slaughter fears political influence will replace the expertise that has guided decisions on issues such as product safety, banking, and media mergers.

In other words, the very work she and some of the roughly 300,000 other civil servants who have been laid off in recent months have unobtrusively carried out for decades. Trump’s purge of the federal workforce is the largest in a single year since World War II.

“The alternative to allowing these agencies to operate as Congress designed is … accruing power to the president,” Slaughter said. “That is something that would be concerning at any time, but really concerning when you have a president who is interested in wielding power for the benefit of himself, his friends and allies — and at the expense of everyday Americans.”

Dismissed

Independent agencies were some of the first targets of Trump’s second-term buzz saw as he slashed government jobs and put the executive branch under a tighter grip.

“My administration will reclaim power from this unaccountable bureaucracy, and we will restore true democracy to America again,” Trump said in his first speech to Congress of his current term.

Slaughter watched with trepidation as Trump fired a Democratic member of the National Labor Relations Board in January and the Democratic chair of the Merit Systems Protection Board in February.

She guessed she might be a target but was still shocked when the email landed in her inbox March 18. Slaughter had spent nearly seven years on the commission and loved the work. Trump had originally appointed her in his first term, and she was reappointed by President Joe Biden.

“Your continued service on the FTC is inconsistent with my Administration’s priorities,” stated the message sent on behalf of the president.

It was the first time in 91 years a president had tried to fire a member of the FTC, which focuses on consumer protection and increasing business competition. Trump also dismissed the other Democrat on the five-member commission, Alvaro Bedoya, leaving only Republicans.

What struck Slaughter was that Trump had given no reason for her dismissal. Congress insulated the FTC from the president through a law allowing the executive to remove commissioners only for “inefficiency, neglect of duty, or malfeasance in office.” Slaughter said firing her without citing any such reason was a blatant and illegal power grab. Almost immediately, she resolved to sue.

The stakes of her public stand quickly became apparent.

After juggling press calls and her daughter’s performance the night of her firing, Slaughter returned home. She received a knock on her door around 11:30 p.m. as her four children slept. It was a pizza delivery she had not ordered. Bedoya got one, too, the same night.

They concluded the pizzas were probably part of a wave sent to the homes of judges and other officials, most of whom had ruled against or opposed Trump’s policies — a reminder that potential assailants knew where they lived. They alerted police and scrubbed personal information from the internet.

But she and Bedoya resolved to stay in the public eye despite the risks. Days later, Slaughter appeared before a House committee to testify about her firing.

“I will not be the first to go down without a fight, and neither will Commissioner Bedoya,” Slaughter told the legislators. “We swore an oath to serve the American people and our Constitution, and I believe that the law will vindicate our right to finish the job.”

The legal fight

That was not so easily accomplished.

The path to the Supreme Court has been winding and full of setbacks. Bedoya had to drop out along the way. His family was struggling financially with one paycheck. The problems were compounded when someone tried to take out a $500,000 line of credit in his name, an act he suspects was tied to his speaking out about his firing.

“It is not fun to take on the president of the United States, particularly in this environment,” Bedoya said. “It’s not fun to not know where your next paycheck will come from or if you will get a paycheck, period.”

Slaughter carried on, with her husband, who works for an investment firm, shouldering the financial load for the family and with help from pro bono attorneys. She has continued to publicly weigh in on matters before the FTC as if she were still on the job, while speaking and making media appearances to draw attention to her case.

“Mommy, I thought that being fired would make you less busy,” Slaughter recalled her 6-year-old daughter telling her.

In July, a federal judge ruled she could return to her job while her case played out in the courts. When Slaughter arrived back to work on a Friday, about two-dozen FTC staffers stood outside and clapped as she entered the building.

The return was exhilarating — but short-lived. By the following Monday, an appeals court had paused her reinstatement. In September, the appeals court ruled she could return to work again, but the Supreme Court soon stayed that order until it makes a final ruling on her dismissal.

Slaughter joked she is the first person in history fired from the FTC three times but said “the whiplash was really disheartening.” Even more disturbing were the glimpses she got inside the FTC during her second stint back.

It was an agency transformed.

“There were a lot of questions about political interference,” Slaughter said of two staff meetings she held. “People seem demoralized. People felt beaten down.”

A case with major ramifications

Slaughter’s case is in many ways a redo of another that changed the course of the federal government nine decades ago.

Through the late 1800s, presidents regularly rewarded political supporters with federal jobs. But the spoils system, as it was called then, was phased out after a backer of President James Garfield who had been denied a position assassinated him. Congress passed new laws for a nonpartisan civil service and prevented some officials from being removed for political reasons.

A major test of those standards came in 1933, when President Franklin D. Roosevelt fired an FTC commissioner over policy disagreements related to economic regulation and the New Deal. William E. Humphrey sued, saying he could be removed only for cause under the law that created the FTC.

The Supreme Court sided with Humphrey, upholding Congress’s ability to limit the president’s firing of the heads of independent agencies. The case, known as Humphrey’s Executor, is little known to the general public, but it has outsize legal importance.

University of Michigan law professor Daniel A. Crane credited it with “paving the way for the modern administrative state” — the alphabet soup of agencies that rely on technical expertise to regulate interest rates, bank deposits, labor disputes, and more.

The agencies are often run by bipartisan commissions, whose members are appointed to staggered terms and can be removed only for cause. The idea was to mitigate political pressure on the agencies, so they could make decisions based on expertise and technical knowledge, rather than political considerations.

Backers of the idea of independent agencies worry the demise of Humphrey’s Executor will mean presidents could politicize regulation of baby food, credit card fees, and a host of other things to please cronies, big donors, and ideological allies.

“The last thing we want is for industry to be able to come in and insert their favorite folks on commissions,” said Erin Witte, director of consumer protection at the Consumer Federation of America. “Congress designed these agencies to be independent for a reason. There’s a lot at stake.”

The Trump administration counters by arguing the contemporary FTC is far different from the one that existed when Humphrey’s Executor was decided. The agency now wields significant executive power, so the president — as head of the executive branch — has the constitutional authority to remove its commissioners.

“In this case, the lower courts have once again ordered the reinstatement of a high-level officer wielding substantial executive authority whom the President has determined should not exercise any executive power,” Solicitor General D. John Sauer wrote in a court filing.

The position is in keeping with a muscular vision of the presidency embraced by Trump and some conservatives, known as the unitary executive theory, that holds the president should have unfettered control over hiring and firing in the executive branch.

So far, the court has appeared to endorse that idea in temporary orders allowing Trump to remove Democrats from the National Labor Relations Board, Consumer Product Safety Commission and Merit Systems Protection Board. Those orders aren’t final decisions on the merits of the cases but give a strong suggestion of where the court’s majority is headed, legal experts say.

“The Supreme Court has given every indication it will overrule Humphrey’s Executor,” Crane said.

Despite the seemingly long odds, Slaughter remains hopeful she will prevail. On a recent morning, she was once again making her case in public before a conference of women who work on antitrust issues.

“Why are you staying in the fight?” the host asked.

Slaughter said that independent agencies are crucial for protecting Americans and that she was taking a stand against Trump’s lawlessness. Trump should have sought a change in the law if he wanted to dismiss her, she said.

“As a person who took an oath to the Constitution, I feel very strongly that when that process for changing the law isn’t followed, then I need to stand up and push back,” Slaughter said. “I really recognize deeply how many people in this country are not in a position to do that. I am, so I have the obligation to do it.”