Why Spain Stands Up to Trump

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Countries around the world have adopted different ways of dealing with US President Donald Trump. Some choose flattery. Some opt to fly under the radar. Spain has chosen frank opposition. Consider how Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez bluntly said no to war when Trump asked to use a Spanish base for attacks on Iran. Madrid also disagrees with Trump's demand that NATO members spend 5% of their GDPs on defense. On issue after issue, whether it's immigration, Israel and Palestine, Venezuela, international law, you name it, the current governments of Spain and the United States have a lot to disagree on. And they're open about that disagreement. On this week's show, why does Spain stand up to Trump and what are the tradeoffs? I will speak with the country's foreign minister.

But first, the big story of the last few days. The White House says it is temporarily lifting US sanctions on Russian oil in a bid to bring down diesel prices. Here's my read on things.

According to the deal, Russia will immediately supply 2.25 million barrels of diesel to US and global markets, with the promise of greater amounts in November and beyond. The deal is receiving widespread criticism. A bipartisan group of senators is urging Trump to reverse his decision, calling it a gift to our adversary and a betrayal of our allies. Europeans are similarly unhappy and angry that Trump is pressuring Ukraine to stop hitting Russian refineries, which is part of the reason global supplies are down. Meanwhile, energy experts are making the case that the new Russian supply will hardly change prices anyway. So why do it? And then finally, countries such as India, which faced US pressure to stop buying Russian oil, are just confused by the policy whiplash. It turns out US values last only as long as it's economically viable.

With so many criticisms, from so many angles, why is Trump doing this?

As always, who knows? I don't think it's fair, however, to just say that Trump is catering to Putin. After all, one year ago, Trump surprised many by sanctioning two of the biggest Russian oil producers, Luke Oil and Rosneft. So perhaps Trump is genuinely desperate, with rising energy costs in the United States affecting his polling numbers.

The irony here is that Trump's problems with energy and inflation aren't really because of Russia. That war is more than four years old, after all. The current crisis stems from his decision to attack Iran in February. And as we now know, on being attacked, Iran moved to shut down the Strait of Hormuz, disrupt shipping and destroy energy infrastructure across the Gulf. All of this is a reminder that the two main wars we talk about, the conflicts in Ukraine and Iran, are increasingly linked. They're connected on energy, as I've been saying. They're connected on financing, as Iran uses Russia and China to evade the worst effects of sanctions. They're connected on trade. And they're connected on weaponry. Russia has long been using Iranian Shahed drones to attack Ukraine. Now that Moscow has souped up those same drones to become jet-powered and much harder to stop, it's a fair bet that it will pass on that technology back to Tehran, which could in turn use them across the Middle East.

More and more, our biggest wars are interconnected. So are their impacts. I think it's a good sign that a bipartisan group of US lawmakers is raising the alarm about Trump's deal with Putin. But the reality is that you can no longer deal with one of these issues in isolation. Policy makers would do well to remember that.

Okay, time now for this week's interview. As I mentioned, countries have adopted a variety of ways to navigate the Trump White House. Spain is one of the rare few countries that has really stood its ground on its professed values, from international law to a progressive immigration policy. And I have two main questions here. First, does such a policy work in terms of outcomes and trade-offs? And second, and most crucially, how do the citizens at home feel about it? The good news is we have a real live test case to answer that second question. In light of a housing crisis, Spain's Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez has called for a snap election in November, hoping to get a bigger mandate to carry out his agenda. Will he win? Some part of it might depend on how Spaniards think about their country's decidedly anti-Trump foreign policy. Well, my guest this week is José Manuel Albares, Spain's Foreign Minister since 2021 Let's dive in.