NATO Secretary General Mark Rutte on Thursday tried to downplay his viral description of President Donald Trump as “daddy” as a “language problem.”
Rutte, 59, set off a wave of memes during a June 2025 presser in The Hague when he used the term to praise Trump’s negotiating and foreign policy tactics.
The former Dutch prime minister used the affectionate phrase soon after Trump lashed out at Israel and Iran following their 12-day conflict, saying the two countries “don’t know what the f*ck they’re doing.”
Trump is PISSED about the ceasefire violations.
“We basically have two countries that have been fighting so long and so hard that they don’t know what the f*** they’re doing.” pic.twitter.com/DVGHuUP3Oj
— Kassy Akiva (@KassyAkiva) June 24, 2025
Rutte, sitting next to the president, said at the time, “Daddy has to sometimes use strong language.”
NATO Secretary General Mark Rutte said “daddy has to sometimes use strong language” on Wednesday, referring to comments made by President Trump about Iran and Israel fighting.
Read more: https://t.co/pIyCLeXNO8 pic.twitter.com/91oWCuOgf8
— ABC News (@ABC) June 25, 2025
Hours later at the NATO Summit, Secretary of State Marco Rubio laughed as an international reporter asked Trump how he felt being called “daddy.”
“I think he likes me,” Trump said. “If he doesn’t, I’ll let you know. I’ll come back and hit him hard.”
“He did it very affectionately. ‘Daddy — you’re my daddy.”
Marco Rubio laughs as a reporter asks Trump how it felt being called “daddy” by NATO Secretary General Mark Rutte pic.twitter.com/aKBWjy8n5B
— Visegrád 24 (@visegrad24) June 25, 2025
Asked again Thursday whether he still considered the commander-in-chief “daddy,” Rutte attributed the remark to a language barrier.
“I have to explain to you, because it follows me a little bit,” Rutte said at Washington’s Ronald Reagan Institute forum. “In Dutch, you would say, ‘Hey, the translation of your father is daddy.’ And I would say, ‘Hey, yeah, sometimes daddy has to be angry. So I was not calling him my daddy. But of course, daddy has also a special connotation, and I now have to live with this for the rest of my life.”
Q: “Do you still consider [President Trump] ‘daddy’ after yesterday?”
@SecGenNATO Mark Rutte: “I was not calling him my daddy, but saying—but of course, ‘daddy’ has also a special connotation, and I have to stay with this for the rest of my life.” pic.twitter.com/sV37k00z8y— CSPAN (@cspan) April 9, 2026
Rutte struck a lighter tone as well, noting Trump had leaned into the moment.
“And I own it. The president owns it, because he brought out t-shirts, he made a movie, Daddy is Home, when he returned to the United States, it was so funny,” Rutte said. “This is why I like him so much.”
🚨 “DADDY” MERCH OUT NOW!https://t.co/YAxVOAdj8y pic.twitter.com/08PnAHhtFX
— Trump War Room (@TrumpWarRoom) June 26, 2025
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