Ahmad Austin Jr.May 19th, 2026, 3:25 pm

Vice President JD Vance on Tuesday accused European media of attacking President Donald Trump in response to a question about the U.S. pulling troops out of the region.

During Tuesday afternoon’s briefing from the White House, a reporter asked Vance about a recent decision made regarding American soldiers in Poland. As reported by Politico, the U.S. recently made the surprising decision to cancel the scheduled deployment of 4,000 soldiers into the country. This has left Polish officials demanding answers, with some reportedly traveling to Washington, D.C. to speak directly with the Trump administration.

The reporter called the decision a “direct contradiction” to Trump’s previous promise not to reduce the U.S. military presence in Poland. He then asked Vance why the administration was “rewarding Putin and punishing your best ally in Europe.”

In response, the vice president said the move was simply a “just a standard delay in rotation” before stating that Poland was capable of defending itself. He then took time to air his grievances with European media as a whole, saying:

But what I’m saying is, it is not accurate to say that we are pulling a bunch of troops out. It is a very small and very minor thing; and I think, frankly, a lot of the European media is overreacting to this a bit.

And here’s here’s one thing I’ll say about about this: look, I have for my entire life — I’m 41 years old — for my entire life, I have heard chirping from the European media about everything that’s wrong with the United States of America. We don’t have this, we don’t have that, we don’t spend enough on healthcare, even though part of the reason why we spend so much on defense was because we have tens of thousands of troops in Europe. I think that if the European media wants to attack the President of the United States, they need to start looking in the mirror. All he has said is that we’re going to be good allies, we’re going to be good friends, we’re going to be trading partners. But it is reasonable for Europe to take a little bit more ownership over its continental integrity.

Watch above via Fox News

New: The Mediaite One-Sheet "Newsletter of Newsletters"
Your daily summary and analysis of what the many, many media newsletters are saying and reporting. Subscribe now!