EU’s Ribera says Trump can’t break trade relations with Spain

European Commission Vice President Teresa Ribera disputed U.S. President Donald Trump’s ability to carry out his threat to cut commercial ties with Spain, pointing out the EU’s foreign trade is negotiated as a bloc.

“It is not possible to engage in [individual] commercial retaliation or business relationships,” Ribera said Wednesday in an interview on Spain’s Cadena Ser radio network. “The trade negotiations of each and every one of the 27 member states of the European Union are the responsibility of the Commission and it is not possible to divide or fragment them.”

Trump on Tuesday threatened to halt trade with Spain after Madrid barred the U.S. from using jointly operated military bases on Spanish soil to attack Iran.

“We’re going to cut off all trade with Spain,” Trump said during a sit-down with German Chancellor Friedrich Merz in the Oval Office. “We don’t want anything to do with Spain.”

Ribera, Spain’s EU commissioner, on Wednesday said Washington’s attempts to single out individual EU countries is “profoundly disturbing, not only for societies, for peace, for cooperation, but also for the economy, and has immediate consequences in everyone’s economic activity as a whole.”

But she she also expressed skepticism regarding Trump’s threat and said, “the American federal government knows” how the EU’s commercial relations are handled and “is not interested in breaking trade relations.”

Comparing the latest clash with Spain to the tariffs Trump threatened to level on the U.K., France and Germany during his campaign to acquire Greenland earlier this year, Ribera insisted that the best way to respond to Trump’s “bully tone” was with unity. “It’s important to stay strong and to stand firm.”

Asked if she thought that the U.S. and Israel’s attack on Iran was illegal, Ribera declined to answer, saying that as a member of the Commission she had to defer to EU leaders and EU top diplomat Kaja Kallas, who are responsible for coordinating the bloc’s foreign policy.

But, she added, “the exercise of force, respect for international law have been the fundamental premises, regardless of whether we like the government of one country or another more or less … Otherwise we could find ourselves with situations that are very difficult to justify that could be used as an argument by others to continue developing this temptation to use force against third parties.”

“We have to respect one another, our citizens, our sovereign decisions, our treaties, and Europe,” Ribera said. “And, above all, there must be respect for international law. The entire Charter of the United Nations requires compliance with conditions, requirements and procedures.”