Voice For Liberty

Trump and Erdoğan Meet in Ankara: F-35 Jets, Sanctions Relief, and a Fully Fact-Checked Breakdown

Bob Weeks

on

President Donald Trump and Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan opened the 2026 NATO summit with a bilateral meeting in Ankara on July 7 that produced one of the biggest Turkey policy shifts of Trump’s second term: an announcement that the U.S. will lift sanctions in place since 2019 and a signal that Washington is open to selling Turkey F-35 stealth fighter jets, reversing a ban imposed after Ankara bought a Russian missile defense system. The meeting took place hours after the U.S. struck more than 80 targets inside Iran and reimposed oil sanctions, and Trump used the moment to blast NATO allies Italy, Germany, France, and the United Kingdom for refusing to help with that fight, floating a full U.S. troop pullout from Europe and reviving his push to take Greenland from Denmark with a claim that has been repeatedly debunked. Trump also repeated several previously fact-checked exaggerations — including a false claim of $19.2 trillion in new U.S. investment — while touting a real $3.6 billion Toyota plant expansion, discussing his recent calls with Vladimir Putin and Volodymyr Zelenskyy about the Ukraine war, and addressing his escalating public feud with Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni. Below is a complete, fact-checked breakdown of everything said. Assistance from Claude AI.

Who Was in the Room

Name Title
Donald J. Trump President of the United States
Recep Tayyip Erdoğan President of the Republic of Turkey; summit host
Unidentified members of the press Reporters in the traveling and Turkish press pools; one addressed by Trump as “Daniel”

Several other officials and world leaders were referenced repeatedly during the exchange without being present. For context, they are identified on first mention below: Pastor Andrew Brunson (American evangelical pastor formerly detained in Turkey), Secretary of State Marco Rubio, Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent, Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth, Russian President Vladimir Putin, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy, Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni, British Prime Minister Keir Starmer, and Syrian President Ahmed al-Sharaa.

A note on this transcript: The official wire transcript marks large portions of President Erdoğan’s remarks, and several reporters’ questions, as “(UNTRANSLATED).” That means the public record includes no English rendering of what Erdoğan actually said in response to a number of questions — including at least one exchange about Russia’s S-400 missile system. Where that’s the case below, it’s noted, since it materially limits what can be reported about Erdoğan’s side of the conversation.

Context: Why This Meeting Happened Now

The bilateral meeting was the opening act of the 2026 NATO Summit, held July 7–8 in Ankara — only the second time Turkey has hosted a NATO summit, after Istanbul in 2004, and the 36th summit overall (NATO, 2026; Wikipedia, 2026a). Heads of state from all 32 NATO members were on hand, with the summit’s official agenda centered on defense spending, defense-industrial production, and support for Ukraine (Congressional Research Service, 2026). It was also Trump’s first visit to Turkey of his second term and the first visit by a sitting U.S. president in eleven years. Trump has said openly that his personal relationship with Erdoğan was a deciding factor in his attending the summit at all (Cook et al., 2026).

Context box — why NATO is under strain right now: This summit arrived amid the worst rupture in trans-Atlantic relations in years. The flashpoint is the 2026 Iran war, a conflict the U.S. and Israel launched on February 28, 2026, with a wave of strikes that killed Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei (Wikipedia, 2026b, 2026c). When Trump later asked European allies for help — base access, warships to help secure the Strait of Hormuz, or simply public backing — several said no, citing legal constraints and a lack of UN authorization (Al Jazeera, 2026a). Trump has not let it go, and it colored nearly everything he said in Ankara.

Opening Statements: Mutual Praise, and a Nod to the Airport

Erdoğan opened the meeting by welcoming Trump to the NATO summit and framing his attendance as adding “strength” to the gathering. Trump’s response set the tone for the rest of the meeting: effusive personal praise for Erdoğan, paired with a claim about Turkey’s military that’s more opinion than checkable fact. Trump said Turkey has become “a very powerful country militarily” under Erdoğan and that people underestimate how strong it’s become — a boast, but not an unreasonable one on its face: Turkey does field NATO’s second-largest standing army (Mammadov, 2026). He also thanked Erdoğan for naming an airport building after him and praised Turkey’s newly repaved roads — improvements that, per AP reporting, were part of a genuine infrastructure push tied to hosting the summit, including a new airport converted from a military airfield (Cook et al., 2026).

Trump previewed the day’s agenda as trade, military cooperation, and Iran — all three of which came up repeatedly in the questions that followed.

The Headline: F-35 Fighter Jets and the End of Turkey Sanctions

The first press question got straight to the biggest story of the day: would the U.S. sell Turkey F-35 stealth fighter jets?

Context box — why this is even a question: Turkey was a founding partner in the F-35 program until 2019, when it bought Russia’s S-400 air defense system over U.S. objections. Washington removed Turkey from the program and, under the 2017 Countering America’s Adversaries Through Sanctions Act (CAATSA), sanctioned Turkey’s defense procurement agency in 2020. A separate 2020 law requires the executive branch to certify that Turkey no longer possesses the S-400 before any F-35 sale can proceed (Al Jazeera, 2026b).

Trump’s answer stopped short of a firm commitment but went further than any U.S. president has since the ban: “It’s a decision we’re going to make,” he said, calling the F-35 “the best plane, by far” and adding that Turkey has been “much more loyal” than other allies. Later in the meeting, asked again, Trump confirmed the administration would remove the CAATSA sanctions outright: “We’re going to be taking the sanctions off, OK?” He said Secretary of State Marco Rubio and Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent were working the issue, framing it simply: “We don’t want to sanction friends.”

Fact-check: ✅ Accurate (as a statement of Trump’s position). Multiple outlets independently confirmed Trump made both the sanctions and F-35 announcements at this meeting, in these words (Cook et al., 2026; Al Jazeera, 2026b; Pamuk & Jackson, 2026). What remains unresolved is whether the sale can actually happen. Even with CAATSA sanctions lifted, the separate law tying F-35 sales to Turkey’s possession of the S-400 stays in effect, meaning Turkey would still need to show it no longer has the Russian system — something it has not done (Pamuk & Jackson, 2026). The move also drew immediate, public opposition from Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who told CNN he opposed the sale directly, and from a bipartisan group of six Republican and four Democratic members of Congress who had written to Trump the week before (CNN, 2026a; New Republic, 2026a). So: the announcement itself is real, but a completed sale is far from settled.

Later, unprompted, Trump also defended the idea of the U.S. servicing and upgrading engines on any planes Turkey already owns, arguing the U.S. has an “obligation” to maintain equipment it sells — an answer that reads as pre-emptively justifying the F-35 decision to skeptics.

“We Got Along From Day One”: Trump, Erdoğan, and the Pastor Brunson Story

Asked what makes the Trump-Erdoğan relationship “so special,” Trump gave a rambling answer that included this story: an American pastor, Andrew Brunson, was jailed in Turkey, Trump felt he was innocent, and “I called the President and he released him immediately,” a gesture Trump said the American evangelical community “will never forget.”

Context box — who was Pastor Brunson? Andrew Brunson, an American evangelical pastor who had lived in İzmir, Turkey since the 1990s, was arrested in 2016 amid the crackdown that followed a failed coup attempt, accused of terrorism and espionage links. He spent nearly two years in detention (Wikipedia, 2026d).

Fact-check: ⚠️ Misleading. The core outcome is real — Brunson was released and it did improve U.S.-Turkey relations — but “immediately” doesn’t hold up. Brunson was detained for roughly two years, moved to house arrest in July 2018, and finally released in October 2018 only after the Trump administration sanctioned two senior Turkish officials and doubled tariffs on Turkish steel and aluminum to force the issue (Wikipedia, 2026d; NBC News, 2018). His release came via a Turkish court verdict — he was convicted on terrorism-related charges but freed for time served — not a unilateral order from Erdoğan following a phone call (CNN, 2018). Turkey’s government had also sought a far longer sentence at earlier stages of the case. The relationship clearly did benefit, as Trump says, but the “one phone call, immediate release” version compresses a two-year pressure campaign into a single gesture.

NATO Under Strain: Troop Drawdowns and the Iran “Loyalty Test”

Two reporters pressed Trump on whether U.S. troop drawdowns from Europe were coming, and whether he was satisfied with NATO allies. His answer became one of the most consequential exchanges of the day.

Trump said he’d been “very disappointed” with NATO and might not have attended the summit at all if it weren’t hosted by Erdoğan. He then pivoted to a specific grievance: the U.S. asked European allies for help during its operation against Iran, “and before I asked, they said they wouldn’t be there.” He singled out the United Kingdom’s prime minister for criticism, saying, “I guess he’s no longer there, maybe because of this,” describing an unpopular decision to withhold help until “after the war is over.” He named Italy, Germany, and France as having “turned us down,” framed the whole episode as a test of allied loyalty (“in a way, I was testing people”), and argued the U.S. gets little in return for the “hundreds of billions of dollars” it spends on European defense.

This is a lot to unpack, so here’s the fact-check broken out claim by claim:

  • The allied refusals: ⚠️ Misleading, but with a real core. Reporting confirms the U.S. did ask European allies for help during the Iran war — base access, overflight rights for weapons transfers, and naval support to reopen the Strait of Hormuz — and that Italy, Germany, France, Spain, and the UK all pushed back to varying degrees (Fox News, 2026a; Al Jazeera, 2026a). But “turned us down” flattens a more mixed picture: Italy restricted U.S. use of its Sicily air base to logistics rather than combat missions (and separately denied one specific bomber request outright); Germany served as a logistics hub while stopping short of endorsing the operation; the UK initially declined strikes from its bases before reversing course as attacks escalated; and France specifically refused to let U.S. weapons shipments to Israel fly over its airspace (Fox News, 2026a). Several allies later joined maritime-security discussions around Hormuz. So the allies weren’t uniformly obstructive, but they also weren’t the reliable partners Trump’s “hundreds of billions” framing implies he expected.
  • The UK prime minister “no longer there… maybe because of this”: ⚠️ Misleading. British Prime Minister Keir Starmer did announce his resignation — but on June 22, 2026, and for reasons reporting attributes overwhelmingly to domestic politics: a Labour Party leadership crisis following dismal May 2026 local election results, cabinet resignations over defense-spending disputes, and Starmer’s own historically low approval ratings (Wikipedia, 2026e; Al Jazeera, 2026c). He also, notably, was still technically the sitting prime minister at the time of this meeting — Labour’s leadership contest to replace him hadn’t even opened nominations yet (they opened July 9, two days after this meeting). Trump has publicly linked Starmer’s exit to the Iran dispute before, at one point saying Starmer’s hesitation showed he was “no Winston Churchill” (Axios, 2026a), but mainstream reporting on Starmer’s resignation does not support Iran policy as a primary driver.
  • “Testing” allies: This framing — that the requests were partly a loyalty test — matches Trump’s own public comments in the days around the summit, including on-camera remarks naming Italy, Germany, and France as having “turned him down” (Fox News, 2026b).

Turkey’s Russian Missile Shield — the Question Nobody Fully Answered

A reporter asked directly about Turkey’s Russian-made S-400 missile defense system and whether it remained a sticking point. This is where the transcript hits its biggest information gap: Erdoğan’s response is marked “(UNTRANSLATED)” in the official record, so there is no public English record of what he said. Trump’s own answer was brief and notably dismissive of the underlying security concern: “I had no concerns at all about anything,” he said, redirecting to praise for Turkey’s infrastructure and insisting the U.S.-Turkey relationship is “better, probably, than it’s ever been.”

This matters because the S-400 is not a side issue — it is the entire legal reason Turkey was removed from the F-35 program in the first place (see the F-35 section above). Trump’s brush-off doesn’t resolve the actual policy conflict: U.S. law still requires certifying Turkey no longer operates the system before any jet sale can go through, and nothing in this exchange indicates that has happened.

Iran: “We Have Essentially Decimated Their Military”

Iran came up constantly, and Trump’s language about it was notably euphemistic. In his opening remarks, he said the U.S. has “essentially decimated” Iran’s military and that Iran “cannot have a nuclear weapon.” Later, describing the same events, he said: “It’s not even a war; it’s a military operation. It’s a denuclearization.”

Context box — the war Trump won’t call a war: On February 28, 2026, the U.S. and Israel launched a surprise campaign of airstrikes against Iran — reportedly close to 900 strikes in the first 12 hours — that killed Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei and other senior officials, along with, by some local estimates, hundreds of civilians (Wikipedia, 2026b, 2026c; Britannica, 2026). Iran retaliated with missile and drone strikes across the region, and the conflict later drew in Hezbollah and rippled into a parallel Israel-Lebanon war. A ceasefire and memorandum of understanding followed, but it has proven fragile: on the very day of this meeting, the U.S. hit more than 80 targets inside Iran and revoked a sanctions waiver on Iranian oil, in retaliation for Iranian attacks on commercial ships in the Strait of Hormuz (CNBC, 2026a; Al Jazeera, 2026d; Times of Israel, 2026).

Fact-check: ℹ️ Needs context, not a clean verdict. Whether Iran’s military has been “decimated” is a matter of ongoing military and political assessment, not a single verifiable number — but independent reporting does confirm a war of significant scale occurred (not merely an “operation”), with an assassinated head of state, mass civilian and military casualties, and a fragile ceasefire that was actively breaking down as this meeting took place. Framing a conflict that killed a sitting supreme leader as something short of a “war” is a rhetorical choice, not a factual one this piece can adjudicate — but readers should know the scale of what “military operation” is standing in for.

The Economy: A Headline Number That Doesn’t Hold Up — and a Real Toyota Deal

Asked about NATO defense cooperation, Trump pivoted to the economy, delivering the sound bite of the day: “We have $19 trillion — $19.2 trillion to be exact — being invested in the United States,” which he said represented the first 12 months of his term, with the true figure “now substantially higher.” He also cited a Toyota announcement that reached him in the car on the way to the meeting: “Toyota is moving out of Mexico into the United States and building one of the biggest truck and car plants ever built… That’s what tariffs do properly used.”

Fact-check on the $19.2 trillion figure: ❌ False. This is a claim Trump has repeated for months, and it does not hold up. At the time he made it, the White House’s own website put total “major investment announcements” for the term at $10.6 trillion — already, per an earlier CNN review, an inflated figure built from vague pledges, statements about bilateral trade rather than U.S. investment, and commitments that don’t rise to formal pledges at all (Dale, 2026; CNN, 2025). Actual new foreign direct investment in the U.S., per Commerce Department data, was about $232 billion in 2025 — a small fraction of the figure Trump cited (Bureau of Economic Analysis, as cited in Dale, 2026).

Fact-check on Toyota: ⚠️ Misleading. Toyota did announce a real $3.6 billion investment on July 6, 2026, to build a second assembly line at its existing San Antonio, Texas plant, shifting most production of its Tacoma pickup there over about four years and adding roughly 2,000 jobs (CBS News, 2026; Bloomberg, 2026). But two parts of Trump’s framing overstate it. First, Toyota is not “moving out of Mexico” — it will keep building Tacomas at its Guanajuato, Mexico plant and is only shifting production away from an older Baja California facility (Pickup Truck +SUV Talk, 2026). Second, this is a major expansion of a plant that’s operated since 2006, roughly doubling its existing footprint — not the construction of a new, standalone “biggest plant ever built.” The investment and job numbers are real; the framing exaggerates their scope.

Ukraine: Calls With Putin and Zelenskyy, New Sanctions, and a Casualty Claim

Multiple questions turned to the Russia-Ukraine war, now in its fifth year. Trump said he’d had “a very good talk” with Russian President Vladimir Putin the day before, followed immediately by a call with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy, and that “they both want to make a deal.” He referenced his broader diplomatic record — “I settled eight wars, and I think we’re going to be settling a ninth” — and, discussing why he’s invested in ending the war, cited a striking casualty figure: “Last month, 35,000 mostly soldiers died. The month before that, it was 24,000. The month before that, it was 27,000, and the month before that, it was 29,000.”

On sanctions, he confirmed a related but separate policy shift from the Turkey announcement: Russia sanctions are also being eased. “I can tell you, we’re going to be taking the sanctions off, OK?… We’re working very closely with Marco Rubio… and with Scott Bessent and with Pete.” He also repeated a claim about U.S. military aid under his predecessor: “When Biden was here, he gave them hundreds of billions of dollars’ worth of equipment. Now I sell the equipment… I sell it not to Ukraine, I sell it to the European Union.”

Breaking down the fact-checks:

  • The Putin and Zelenskyy calls: ✅ Accurate, with important context. Trump did hold separate calls with both leaders around the July 4 holiday weekend — the Kremlin described the Putin call as lasting roughly 90 minutes (Al Jazeera, 2026e; Euronews, 2026). (“Yesterday” is a slight looseness; the calls took place several days before this meeting, over the Independence Day weekend, not literally the day prior.) Whether “they both want to make a deal” is accurate is less clear: the Kremlin’s own account of the call describes Russia insisting on a settlement “with due account of Russia’s fundamental approach” and accuses Ukraine and its allies of trying to escalate rather than end the conflict — hardly the language of an imminent breakthrough (Al Jazeera, 2026e). Russian and Ukrainian forces were still disputing control of at least one contested town (Kostiantynivka) the same weekend.
  • “I settled eight wars”: ❌ False. This is one of Trump’s most frequently repeated foreign-policy claims, and independent fact-checking finds it doesn’t survive scrutiny. The tally reportedly includes two situations that were never wars during his tenure (a diplomatic dispute between Egypt and Ethiopia, and an unclear situation involving Serbia and Kosovo); a Rwanda-Democratic Republic of Congo conflict that has not actually ended despite a brokered agreement; the Israel-Hamas war, where Israel has continued near-daily strikes in Gaza despite a U.S.-brokered ceasefire; and the brief 2025 Israel-Iran conflict, after which Israel and the U.S. went on to launch the larger 2026 Iran war described above (Dale, 2026).
  • The casualty figures (“35,000… died” last month): ℹ️ Unverifiable as stated. Independent trackers do describe extraordinary monthly losses in this war — Ukrainian officials, for instance, said Russia suffered over 35,000 troops killed or wounded in what was then a record month (Wikipedia, 2026f) — but no public tally matches Trump’s specific four-month sequence of deaths alone, and serious trackers consistently distinguish “killed” from “killed and wounded,” a distinction Trump’s framing collapses. The general order of magnitude — that this war has produced extraordinarily high monthly casualties on both sides — is well documented; the specific numbers Trump cited are not independently verifiable from public sources.
  • Biden’s Ukraine aid (“hundreds of billions of dollars’ worth of equipment”): ⚠️ Misleading — an exaggeration. The Kiel Institute for the World Economy, which tracks international aid to Ukraine, put total U.S. military aid at roughly $74 billion from just before the 2022 invasion through April 2026; total U.S. aid including financial and humanitarian assistance was about $132 billion (Dale, 2026). That’s a large sum, but well short of Trump’s framing, and specifically for “equipment” the real figure is closer to $74 billion than “hundreds of billions.”

The Meloni Feud Resurfaces

A reporter asked Trump directly about a Truth Social post from the weekend before the summit, in which Trump shared a doctored image of himself and Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni captioned “RESTRAINING ORDER NEEDED.” Trump downplayed it — “I think she’s a nice person, actually” — while making clear the real source of his frustration: Meloni’s government declining to help with the Strait of Hormuz. “She refused to get involved… So it soured my relationship with her a little bit,” he said, adding that Italy “wasn’t there for us.”

Context box — how this feud started: Trump and Meloni were unusually close for a European leader and a U.S. president; she was the only European head of government invited to Trump’s January 2025 inauguration. The relationship frayed after Italy declined to let U.S. military aircraft use a Sicilian air base without parliamentary approval, and after Trump publicly (and falsely, per Meloni) claimed she had “begged” him for a photo at the G7. The July 5 meme — a real G7 photo digitally altered to change Meloni’s expression — was the latest escalation (Forbes, 2026; France 24, 2026).

Fact-check: ✅ Accurate, in that Trump did post the meme and did cite the Hormuz Strait refusal as his underlying grievance — both are independently confirmed by multiple outlets covering the same weekend (Forbes, 2026; Newsweek, 2026; France 24, 2026). Whether Meloni’s position “soured” the relationship or Trump’s public attacks did is a matter of perspective the source reporting treats as genuinely disputed between the two governments.

Syria’s New Government

Trump volunteered praise for Syria’s transitional leader, Ahmed al-Sharaa, crediting himself and Erdoğan with putting him in power: “I put him there along with the President. We were the two that really wanted him… In a year and a half, he’s pulled the whole country together.”

Context box — who is Ahmed al-Sharaa? Al-Sharaa led the rebel coalition that toppled Bashar al-Assad in December 2024, ending 54 years of Assad family rule, and was named president in early 2025. He fought U.S. forces in Iraq as a young al-Qaeda-linked insurgent before later breaking with the group (Wikipedia, 2026g; ABC News, 2025).

Fact-check: ⚠️ Misleading. Trump and Erdoğan did play a real role in al-Sharaa’s international rehabilitation — Trump credited both Erdoğan and Saudi Arabia’s Crown Prince when he announced the U.S. would lift sanctions on Syria and met al-Sharaa in Riyadh in May 2025, over Israeli objections (PBS News, 2025; CSIS, 2026). But “I put him there” overstates it: al-Sharaa’s rise to power came from his own coalition’s military campaign against Assad, not U.S. or Turkish installation, though Turkey had long supported factions within that coalition (Wikipedia, 2026g). And “pulled the whole country together” glosses over real, ongoing instability documented by multiple outlets: unresolved integration talks with Kurdish-led forces, clashes in Aleppo in early 2026, and deadly Druze-Bedouin violence in Suwayda in mid-2025 (Wikipedia, 2026g; Outlook India, 2026).

Greenland — and a Threat to Pull U.S. Troops Out of Europe

In the meeting’s final exchange, a reporter’s question (marked “(inaudible)” in the transcript, but evidently about Greenland) prompted Trump’s most expansive comments of the day. He argued Greenland “should be controlled by the United States, not by Denmark,” claiming the island “is surrounded by China ships and Russian ships.” He blamed the dispute for damaging his relationship with NATO broadly and floated the idea of a full American military withdrawal from the continent: “We could remove all of our soldiers out of Europe.”

Fact-check: ❌ False on the ships claim. This is a claim Trump has made repeatedly, and it has been directly and repeatedly rejected — by the Danish government and military, by officials in other Nordic countries, by Greenlandic officials and residents, and by current and former U.S. officials (Dale, 2026). The commander of Denmark’s Arctic military forces said in an interview the month before this meeting that, as usual, no Chinese or Russian ships had been observed in or around Greenland (Dale, 2026). Danish Prime Minister Mette Frederiksen and Greenlandic Foreign Minister Múte Egede both again rejected Trump’s position at this same summit (CNBC, 2026b; PBS News, 2026b).

The troop withdrawal threat, by contrast, reflects a real and ongoing policy shift: Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth had already announced a six-month review of U.S. force posture in Europe, and the administration has discussed a phased drawdown of U.S. warplanes, ships, and submarines from the continent tied partly to allied responses on defense spending and Iran (Axios, 2026a; NPR, 2026). Whether that becomes a full withdrawal, as Trump suggested here, remains speculative.

Quick Hits: Other Claims Worth Flagging

A few smaller claims from the exchange, for completeness:

  • The 2020 election was “rigged”: ❌ False. While explaining his non-consecutive terms, Trump described his time out of office as “the four years where we had a rigged election.” This is a lie Trump repeats often: he lost a legitimate, certified election to Joe Biden, and no evidence has ever substantiated the fraud claims necessary to change that outcome (Dale, 2026).
  • Turkey’s military strength: Trump’s claim that Turkey has become unusually powerful militarily under Erdoğan is broadly supported — Turkey fields NATO’s second-largest army and has become a significant defense exporter — though “somebody to be reckoned with” is a subjective characterization rather than a specific, checkable figure (Mammadov, 2026; Al Jazeera, 2026f).

Sources

  1. NATO. (2026). Overview – 2026 NATO Summit in Ankara. https://www.nato.int/en/news-and-events/events/2026/07/overview—2026-nato-summit-in-ankara-
  2. Wikipedia. (2026a). 2026 Ankara NATO summit. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2026_Ankara_NATO_summit
  3. Congressional Research Service. (2026). NATO: Issues for the July 2026 Ankara Summit. Congress.gov. https://www.congress.gov/crs-product/R49018
  4. Cook, L., Fraser, S., Sewell, A., & Kim, S. M. (2026, July 7). WATCH: Trump says in Erdogan meeting that U.S. will lift Turkey sanctions, consider selling F-35s. PBS News. https://www.pbs.org/newshour/world/watch-trump-says-in-erdogan-meeting-that-u-s-will-lift-turkey-sanctions-consider-selling-f-35s
  5. Al Jazeera. (2026a, April 1). How are NATO allies pushing back against Trump’s Iran war demands? https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2026/4/1/how-are-nato-allies-pushing-back-against-trumps-iran-war-demands
  6. Wikipedia. (2026b). 2026 Iran war. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2026_Iran_war
  7. Wikipedia. (2026c). Assassination of Ali Khamenei. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Assassination_of_Ali_Khamenei
  8. Mammadov, A. (2026). NATO’s Turkey paradox. Modern War Institute. https://mwi.westpoint.edu/natos-turkey-paradox/
  9. Al Jazeera. (2026b, July 7). Trump says will lift sanctions on Turkiye, ‘consider’ selling F-35s. https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2026/7/7/trump-says-will-lift-sanctions-on-turkiye-consider-selling-f-35s
  10. Pamuk, H., & Jackson, K. (2026, July 7). Trump says he will lift Turkey sanctions, decide on selling F-35s. Reuters, via U.S. News. https://www.usnews.com/news/world/articles/2026-07-07/trump-says-will-lift-turkey-sanctions-decide-on-selling-f-35s
  11. CNN. (2026a, July 7). Exclusive: Netanyahu tells CNN he opposes US sale of F-35 jets to Turkey as he downplays divisions with Trump. https://www.cnn.com/2026/07/07/politics/netanyahu-opposes-sale-f35-jets
  12. New Republic. (2026a, July 7). Trump announces he’s giving Turkey — and Russia — a massive gift. https://newrepublic.com/post/212760/trump-plan-sell-f-35s-turkey-lift-sanctions
  13. Wikipedia. (2026d). Andrew Brunson. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Andrew_Brunson
  14. NBC News. (2018, October 13). Pastor Andrew Brunson meets with Trump after release from detention in Turkey. https://www.nbcnews.com/news/world/pastor-andrew-brunson-meets-trump-after-release-detention-turkey-n919811
  15. CNN. (2018, October 13). Released US pastor Andrew Brunson returns to US, meets with Trump. https://www.cnn.com/2018/10/13/politics/us-pastor-andrew-brunson-trump-oval-office
  16. Fox News. (2026a, July 7). Trump arrives at NATO Ankara summit angry over Iran operation allies. https://www.foxnews.com/politics/trump-arrives-nato-summit-iran-rift-looms-over-alliance-talks.amp
  17. Wikipedia. (2026e). 2026 Labour Party leadership crisis. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2026_Labour_Party_leadership_crisis
  18. Al Jazeera. (2026c, June 22). Why has Keir Starmer resigned as UK prime minister, and who will take over? https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2026/6/22/why-has-keir-starmer-resigned-as-uk-prime-minister-and-who-will-take-over
  19. Axios. (2026a, July 7). “I just want loyalty”: Trump’s Iran grudge hangs over NATO summit. https://www.axios.com/2026/07/07/trump-nato-iran-war-grudge
  20. Fox News. (2026b, July 7). Trump says he was ‘testing’ NATO allies after Iran operation, says Italy, Germany and France turned him down [Video]. https://www.foxnews.com/video/6400442618112
  21. CNBC. (2026a, July 7). U.S. completes strikes on multiple Iranian targets after Hormuz Strait ship attacks, Centcom says. https://www.cnbc.com/amp/2026/07/07/us-strikes-iran-hormuz-ships.html
  22. Al Jazeera. (2026d, July 7). US strikes southern Iran, Tehran claims attacks on US military sites. https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2026/7/7/us-says-strikes-launched-as-explosions-heard-in-southern-iran
  23. Times of Israel. (2026, July 7). US strikes Iran, revokes oil sanctions waiver after attacks on tankers in Hormuz. https://www.timesofisrael.com/us-strikes-iran-revokes-oil-sanctions-waiver-after-attacks-on-tankers-in-hormuz/
  24. Britannica. (2026). 2026 Iran war. https://www.britannica.com/event/2026-Iran-war
  25. Dale, D. (2026, July 7). Fact check: Five false claims Trump made in one meeting with Erdogan. CNN, via KTEN. https://www.kten.com/news/politics/fact-check-five-false-claims-trump-made-in-one-meeting-with-erdogan/article_5d0994f9-f1eb-54fa-b8d8-1ad2b5b7d10c.html
  26. CNN. (2025, October 11). Fact check: Trump’s $17 trillion investment claim. https://www.cnn.com/2025/10/11/politics/fact-check-trump-17-trillion-investment
  27. CBS News. (2026, July 7). Toyota investing $3.6 billion in Texas plant, moving most Tacoma pickup production from Mexico. https://www.cbsnews.com/news/toyota-3-6-billion-texas-plant-san-antonio-tacoma-pickup-production-from-mexico/
  28. Bloomberg. (2026, July 6). Toyota to shift production of truck from Mexico plant to Texas. https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2026-07-06/toyota-to-shift-production-of-truck-from-mexico-plant-to-texas
  29. Pickup Truck +SUV Talk. (2026, July 7). Toyota’s $3.6B Tacoma production move from Mexico is not the whole enchilada. https://pickuptrucktalk.com/2026/07/toyotas-3-6b-tacoma-production-move-from-mexico-is-not-the-whole-enchilada/
  30. Al Jazeera. (2026e, July 5). Trump offers to help end Russia-Ukraine war in Putin call, Kremlin says. https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2026/7/5/trump-offers-to-help-end-ukraine-war-in-long-call-with-putin-kremlin-says
  31. Euronews. (2026, July 5). Zelenskyy and Putin hold Fourth of July phone calls with Trump. https://www.euronews.com/2026/07/05/zelenskyy-and-putin-hold-fourth-of-july-phone-calls-with-trump
  32. Wikipedia. (2026f). Casualties of the Russo-Ukrainian war. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Casualties_of_the_Russo-Ukrainian_war
  33. Forbes. (2026, July 6). Trump reignites Meloni feud with ‘restraining order’ post ahead of NATO summit. https://www.forbes.com/sites/siladityaray/2026/07/06/trump-reignites-feud-with-meloni-with-restraining-order-post-ahead-of-nato-summit/
  34. France 24. (2026, July 6). ‘Restraining order needed’: Trump shares doctored Meloni meme to reignite feud. https://www.france24.com/en/restraining-order-needed-trump-shares-doctored-meloni-meme-to-reignite-feud-1
  35. Newsweek. (2026, July 6). Trump reignites feud with Italy’s Meloni: “Restraining order needed.” https://www.newsweek.com/trump-reignites-feud-italy-meloni-restraining-order-12160062
  36. PBS News. (2025, May 13). Trump says he will lift sanctions on Syria, moves to restore relations with new leader. https://www.pbs.org/newshour/world/trump-says-he-will-lift-sanctions-on-syria-moves-to-restore-relations-with-new-leader
  37. CSIS. (2026, February 3). Trump announces lifting of sanctions on Syria. https://www.csis.org/analysis/trump-announces-lifting-sanctions-syria
  38. Wikipedia. (2026g). Ahmed al-Sharaa. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ahmed_al-Sharaa
  39. ABC News. (2025, May 18). From al-Qaeda to Syria’s presidency, the rise of Ahmad al-Sharaa. https://abcnews.com/International/al-qaeda-syrias-presidency-rise-ahmad-al-sharaa/story?id=121788656
  40. Outlook India. (2026, July). Why is Donald Trump meeting Volodymyr Zelenskyy and Syria’s Ahmed al-Sharaa? What’s at stake. https://www.outlookindia.com/international/why-is-donald-trump-meeting-volodymyr-zelenskyy-and-syrias-ahmed-al-sharaa-whats-at-stake
  41. CNBC. (2026b, July 7). Trump renews Greenland threats at NATO summit, says U.S. could remove troops from Europe. https://www.cnbc.com/2026/07/07/trump-nato-summit-greenland-us-troops-europe.html
  42. PBS News. (2026b, July 7). Trump again demands Greenland as NATO unveils military projects worth billions to prove its firepower. https://www.pbs.org/newshour/world/trump-again-demands-greenland-as-nato-unveils-military-projects-worth-billions-to-prove-its-firepower
  43. NPR. (2026, July 7). NATO summit set to begin in Turkey. https://www.npr.org/2026/07/07/nx-s1-5879166/nato-summit-set-to-begin-in-turkey
  44. Al Jazeera. (2026f, July 7). NATO summit begins in Turkiye’s Ankara: Who is attending, what is at stake? https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2026/7/7/nato-summit-begins-who-is-attending-and-what-is-at-stake

Works Cited (Transcript)

“President Donald J. Trump Participates in a Bilateral Meeting with President Recep Tayyip Erdogan of Turkey, Ankara, Turkey.” Political Transcript Wire, 7 July 2026, ProQuest, https://www.proquest.com/usnews/wire-feeds/president-donald-j-trump-participates-bilateral/docview/3361606640/sem-2?accountid=46614.

Posted

in

by

Bob Weeks

Tags:

, , ,