The prospect of the U.S. leaving the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) is once again being floated by some of the nation’s most powerful individuals.
U.S. Senator Mike Lee (R-UT) took to social media on March 3, posting the following:
Obviously our European allies don’t need us
Let’s leave NATO
We don’t fit in there https://t.co/112IBoPCT5
— Mike Lee (@BasedMikeLee) March 3, 2025
Lee’s message was in response to a video of Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy meeting with European Union leaders. The European meeting came just two days after Zelenskyy had a public rift with President Donald Trump and Vice President J.D. Vance in the Oval Office, The Dallas Express reported.
Elon Musk responded to Sen. Lee on X with one telling word: “Yes.”
The European Union and NATO are not the same organization. The European Union is an economic and political union between various European nations but does not include the United States. NATO is a common defense treaty between many European nations and the U.S.
Most of the European Union’s members are also members of NATO, but some, such as Austria, are not.
NATO was founded after World War II as a counterbalance to the Soviet Union’s military influence. Since the fall of the Soviet Union in the early 1990s, American officials have discussed whether the U.S. should remain in the organization.
In 2023, then-Senators Tim Kaine (D-VA) and Marco Rubio (R-FL) spearheaded legislation to bar any president from unilaterally withdrawing from NATO. It passed Congress and was signed by then-President Joe Biden.
“The bipartisan attempt to add checks and balances highlights the lengths Congress is willing to go to protect the U.S.-NATO relationship amid ongoing Russian aggression [in the Ukraine] and after years of criticism of the military alliance during Trump’s presidential tenure,” Kaine said in a press release at the time.
During each of his presidential bids, Trump has criticized NATO and indicated that membership in the organization is too expensive.
“NATO is costing us a fortune and, yes, we’re protecting Europe but we’re spending a lot of money,” he told The Washington Post in 2016.