German Chancellor Merkel to meet with Trump for first time Friday

WASHINGTON — German Chancellor Angela Merkel will meet for the first time with President Donald Trump on Friday.

This is probably not the meeting Merkel envisioned last fall when she had reason to expect that a 2017 trip to the White House would offer up a sisterhood love-fest between newly-minted President Hillary Clinton and herself — two like-minded feminist world leaders known for their pragmatism and survival skills.

Instead Merkel will shake hands with the upstart billionaire who is known to rate women based on their curves and has accused Merkel of “ruining Germany.”

They disagree on trade, nationalism and immigration. Personality wise they are polar opposites. Her signature phrase is, “We’ll manage it.” Before Trump ran for office, his signature phrase was, “You’re fired.”

Trump used to be a big fan of Merkel, and still refers to the chancellor as a “really great world leader.” But in 2015, she rolled out a welcome mat for a million asylum seekers. “It was an audacious act that, in a single motion, threatened both to redeem Europe and endanger it,” Time Magazine wrote.

Trump took the opposite tack. When he won office, he issued two executive orders that put a four-month hold on America’s refugee resettlement program. Both orders have been stayed by federal judges.

It’s all part of his “America first” focus. Merkel is an unapologetic globalist who has no use for “protectionist and nationalistic approaches.”

“I think it’s going to be a difficult relationship,” Ty Cobb, a foreign policy adviser to President Ronald Reagan now with the National Security Forum, predicted from his home in Reno. “I see this Trump-Merkel relationship being much like (former Canadian Prime Minister Pierre) Trudeau and Reagan” whose first meeting was “frosty” and riven with serious policy differences. “My bet is that one-on-one in the Oval Office will be a frigid affair.”

That’s not the plan. On a conference call with reporters last week, a senior White House official emphasized that the meeting’s purpose is to “build a personal relationship and have a positive interaction.”

Merkel’s mission will be to move Trump from his protectionist instincts — especially his threat to levy tariffs on imports. Team Trump is likely to push back with the charge that Berlin has forced a too low valuation on the Euro – giving the European Union giant a huge export advantage, Cobb noted.

Trump frequently has complained about allies’ failure to pay their fair share for the common defense. America’s NATO allies are supposed to spend at least 2 percent of their gross domestic product on the military. At 1.1 percent of GDP, Germany falls far short of that mark, while the United States protects all of NATO by spending 3.6 percent of GDP on defense.

On the national security front, Merkel has voiced concern about the potential for further Russian aggression in the Baltics and Ukraine.

According to the senior official, Trump is “very interested” in gleaning insights from Merkel about working with Russian President Vladimir Putin. Cobb believes Merkel can make a good pitch to Trump about America’s strong economic position – of which Putin should be “envious.” A smart appeal, said Cobb, would be to tell Trump, “you’re holding the high cards now.” Next to the United States, Russia economically is “still a banana republic.”

Merkel also can count on Trump’s desire to be liked. As he said of Merkel during a 2015 rally, “I like her. I better like her — I may have to deal with her. Look, hey, Putin likes me. I want her to like me too.”

Contact Debra J. Saunders at dsaunders@reviewjournal.com or at 202-662-7391. Follow @DebraJSaunders on Twitter.