In June, during a NATO summit in The Hague, things took a turn for the Oedipal when Dutch prime minister-turned-NATO chief Mark Rutte referred to Donald Trump as “Daddy”. The remark came after Trump compared Iran and Israel to unruly children in a schoolyard fight, prompting Rutte to quip, “Daddy has to sometimes use strong language to get them to stop.”
Trump, naturally, ran with it, telling reporters, “He did it very affectionately: ‘Daddy, you’re my daddy.’”
Rutte tried to clarify later that he wasn’t actually calling Trump his daddy, but merely making a metaphor about American leadership. The White House ignored the nuance entirely and leaned in, hard, by posting a video montage of Trump’s NATO visit set to Usher’s “Hey Daddy (Daddy’s Home)” with the caption: “Daddy’s home… Hey, hey, hey, Daddy.”
Because we killed Harambe, this is the reality we live in July 2025. And today, Rutte and Trump met at ‘Daddy’s’ White House to discuss the ongoing war between Russia and Ukraine.
Rumors proliferated before the two men appeared in public. It was said that the president’s patience had worn thin with Vladimir Putin (the Russian premier “talks nice and then bombs everybody in the evening,” Trump said at an earlier press conference in the Rose Garden, adding: “There’s a little bit of a problem there, and I don’t like it.”) The Russian strongman, known for jailing political activists and outlawing protest, had apparently “surprised everyone” by turning out to not be a very nice guy after all. Trump is “really pissed” about that, according to Senate mean girl Lindsey Graham.
And then, at 11 a.m., a press conference began that featured all the Trumpian greatest hits: weird flattery, bombastic nationalism, random asides about Gazan real estate, quasi-romantic compliments about other world leaders, accusations of election-stealing from the Democrats, along with obsessive and repetitive insults aimed at Joe Biden.
The gist: As expected, U.S. weapons will be deployed to Ukraine through a slightly convoluted method, and Europe will foot the bill. And large secondary sanctions on countries buying Russian goods and oil will come into effect in 50 days, in the hope of forcing Putin back to the negotiating table.
“We are very unhappy — well, I am — with Russia,” Trump said, before adding that Ukraine is “not my war, it’s Biden’s war.” A few minutes later, turning to Rutte, he said, apropos nothing, that “Mark” was “just a highly respected, pretty young guy” who has had an “amazing career.”
As the highly respected, pretty young guy — who is 58 years old — nodded along with the U.S. president’s increasingly incoherent speech, Trump then cycled through claims that he had personally stopped a nuclear war between India and Pakistan, that his diplomacy with Rwanda had changed Africa, that the Gaza Strip was “the worst real estate deal ever made” because “they [presumably Israel] gave up the oceanfront property,” that he’s beginning construction on the so-called Golden Dome, and that, when it came to Putin, “I was the apple of his eye.”
“It’s nice when the Nile River has water,” he said at one point, as Rutte continued to nod sagely.
We have now seen a number of White House press conferences between Trump and world leaders attempting to remain cordial with him. I say press conferences, but really it’s just a succession of people finding out that if you sit beside Trump and smile for long enough without contradicting him, he will keep pushing into freewheeling absurdity, and you will inevitably get hit with some of the splatter.
So it was as Trump opened for questions at the end of his presser with Rutte and eventually devolved into a long monologue about Biden’s use of an autopen. “I hope you’ll back me up in this,” he said to Rutte at one point, while claiming that America was “dead” a year ago because of Biden and now we “have the hottest country anywhere in the world.”
Again, Rutte nodded.
Wrapping up, Daddy rewarded Rutte by calling him a “star”. If you think this is a deeply unserious way in which to approach a new weapons deal with Ukraine, a succession of global tariffs and a continuing conflict in which thousands of innocents have been killed, you’re absolutely correct — and you’re absolutely out-of-touch. Because this is modern-day diplomacy, baby. Putin’s out; NATO’s in, and Donald has a new apple of his eye.
If Vlad wants to get back in the good books, he’ll have to high-tail it back to Istanbul and promise he won’t do a colonial invasion again.
