Erdoğan cashes in on Trump relationship for Turkey

International Erdoğan cashes in on Trump relationship for Turkey Comments: by Laura Kelly - 06/27/26 12:00 PM ET Comments: Link copied by Laura Kelly - 06/27/26 12:00 PM ET Comments: Link copied

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Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan is cashing in on his relationship with President Trump, scoring benefits from sanctions relief to dropped court cases ahead of a high-stakes NATO summit in Ankara next month.

Trump’s decision to greenlight a more than $700 million military sales package to Turkey this week — despite a pushback from some lawmakers — represents Erdoğan’s latest win in Washington. The sale is for advanced jet engines, allowing Turkey to follow through on developing its domestic fleet of next-generation fighter jets.

Trump lavished praise on Erdoğan when asked Wednesday about the military sale by a reporter, commending the Turkish leader for holding back aid to Iran when the U.S. and Israel launched the war against that country in late February.

“He was a prime candidate to go into the war with Iran, maybe on the Iran side because he’s not a big fan of Israel as you know. And I asked him to stay out. He stayed out,” Trump said.

“Erdoğan’s a great leader, very strong person, great military … everything I’ve ever asked him for he’s done.”

The president’s revelation drew immediate pushback from Mark Levin, a conservative Fox News host who is typically a vocal Trump supporter but has come out against the memorandum of understanding the administration signed with Iran.

“Stop giving our best technology away to Islamist nut job Erdogan! Turkey became a NATO member long before Erdoğan seized power,” Levin, a staunch advocate for Israel, posted on social platform X.

Levin’s criticism spoke to the complicated relationship the U.S. and its allies have had with Turkey throughout Erdoğan’s more than two decades in power.

Turkey is a strategic and powerful NATO ally. It straddles Europe and the Middle East, borders the Caucasus and Iran, and controls an important maritime route connecting the Black Sea and the Mediterranean. Turkey is also recognized for hosting nearly 3 million refugees, the majority having fled the Syrian civil war and threats from the Islamic State over the course of the 2010s.

But Erdoğan is condemned by Europe and pro-democracy groups for exercising an iron fist over his country, threatening allies and cozying up to adversaries.

Erdoğan has consolidated power in the presidency and culled the opposition, jailing political opponents, journalists, academics, artists or anyone else with a critical voice. Erdoğan has threatened NATO-members and neighbors Greece and Cyprus. And he has deepened relationships with Russia, China, Iran and its proxy in the Gaza Strip, Hamas.

“As long as Turkey is under the leadership of Erdoğan who aligns himself with Iran and Russia, harbors Hamas & remains the only NATO member to not sanction Russia, Turkey should NOT receive our best jets and military equipment,” Rep. Nicole Malliotakis (R-N.Y.) posted on X.

Erdoğan cares deeply about what American presidents think of him, said Gönül Tol, senior fellow at the Middle East Institute, adding that there’s an overt personal chemistry with Trump.

Loyalty is a priority for Trump, and Erdoğan has seemingly played a good soldier — rarely, if ever, criticizing Trump despite rabid anti-American, anti-Israel and pro-Palestinian sentiment in Turkey. A recent Pew survey found only 6 percent of Turkish respondents had confidence in Trump to do the right thing in world affairs, and only 13 percent had a favorable view of the U.S.

Erdoğan’s close ties with Trump have provided him with international legitimacy and leverage that shields him from isolation in NATO and Europe.

Erdoğan is viewed as a powerful force keeping Trump engaged in NATO; the president told reporters Wednesday he’s only going to the NATO summit in July because Erdoğan is hosting. NATO, in turn, has blocked dozens of Turkish journalists from covering the summit at Erdoğan’s request.

“For summits and ministerial meetings held outside NATO Headquarters, NATO relies on the host nation to provide assessments on journalists from their country to ensure access to the meeting site,” a NATO spokesperson said.

Tol said Erdoğan’s Turkey is viewed as a powerful base of military production that can make up for U.S. shortfalls in equipment deliveries — from production delays, U.S. protectionism, and now a need to refill badly depleted American stockpiles because of the war in Iran. The client base runs from Europe to the Persian Gulf.

“Turkey comes in handy there. It already has these defense partnerships, and it’s only going to strengthen those partnerships. So that’s a welcome byproduct of the Trump administration’s decisions,” she said.

On top of the jet engines, Trump said he intends to bring Turkey back into the F-35 fighter jet program — despite the fact that Turkey is under U.S. sanctions for its possession of a Russian air defense system, the S-400. Trump imposed those sanctions during his first term in office, something mandated by the 2019 Countering America’s Adversaries through Sanctions Act.

“I’m going to probably do something that’s going to make him very happy,” Trump said Wednesday when asked about the F-35s.

Congress has shown openness to finding a solution with Turkey to dispose of or lock up the Russian air defense systems, but Ankara never followed through.

“Turkey, the country that funds Hamas, the Muslim Brotherhood, hates Israel, loves Russia and Iran … good luck getting the F35, F16, and any other American made defense platform,” Sen. Rick Scott (R-Fla.), a key Trump ally, posted on X in April.

“I told Erdoğan in 2018 and I tell him again: you’re NOT getting the F35,” Scott wrote at the time.

Scott was responding to statements by U.S. Ambassador to Turkey Tom Barrack boasting of how Trump and Erdoğan’s personal relationship has improved relations between the two countries.

A meeting between Trump and Erdoğan resulted in the dismissal of a major lawsuit against Turkey’s largest state-owned bank, Halkbank, which had been charged with evading U.S. sanctions on Iran and providing $20 billion to the regime. Erdoğan was named in the trial as personally intervening to subvert U.S. sanctions.

“President Trump, President Erdoğan with their teams, sat down, gone, Halkbank is now gone,” Barrack said at the Antalya Diplomacy Forum in April.

It took a few more weeks for the Halkbank issue to formally wrap up. On June 17, a federal judge approved the Justice Department’s request for “deferred prosecution” against the bank, which did not admit criminal wrongdoing and did not impose a fine — the of proceeds which would have benefited American victims of terrorism. Halkbank said it would not engage in transactions that benefit Iran.

The Department of Justice (DOJ) said Turkey’s role in securing hostages kidnapped by Hamas during its Oct. 7, 2023, terrorist attack on Israel and its help in brokering a ceasefire between the U.S.-designated terrorist group and Israel led to the agreement on Halkbank.

Democratic lawmakers outraged over the settlement pointed out that the administration was rewarding Turkey’s intervention to end a war that was carried out with key Iranian support, funded with help by Ankara.

“The sanctions evasion scheme, involving billions of dollars, was a critical financial lifeline for the Iranian regime during the same years it carried out wide-scale global terrorist activities, which included the kidnapping, torture, and murder of Americans,” Sens. Adam Schiff (D-Calif.) and Richard Blumenthal (D-Conn.), wrote in a letter to the DOJ in April.

Immediately after the Halkbank settlement, the bank’s shares rose, and the CEO said the bank is expected to expand its access to foreign funding.

Erdoğan will enter the NATO summit July 7-8 with diminished political opponents, silenced domestic critics and renewed access to the international banking system. His government is fielding military production requests and exercising influence in a changing Middle East.

“Turkey is pitching this moment, pitching itself as the savior of NATO,” Tol said.

“So he’s riding high on the international front, and he doesn’t care about the public reaction.”

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