Donald Trump said on Wednesday that he knows who he wants for his running mate in the 2024 race for US president and that his commitment to the Nato alliance will depend on how Europeans treat the United States.
The frontrunner for the Republican nomination, Mr Trump was asked by anchors at a live Fox News town hall who was under consideration for vice president on his ticket.
"I can't tell you that really. I mean I know who it's going to be," Mr Trump told the gathering of Republican voters in Des Moines, Iowa, five days before that Midwestern state's first-in-the-country nominating context.
In a follow-up question he was asked whether he would be open to mending ties with any of his rivals in the race, to which he responded: "Oh sure, I will."
Speculation about a running mate has focused in part on Elise Stefanik, a Trump ally and fourth-ranking Republican in the House of Representatives, and on Nikki Haley, a rival who was UN ambassador from 2017-18 during Mr Trump's administration.
Stance on Nato questioned
Mr Trump was asked about his stance on Nato - a question that followed the disclosure on Wednesday that Mr Trump told top European officials while he was president that the United States would never help Europe if it came under attack.
"Depends if they treat us properly," Mr Trump said when asked by the Fox anchors about his commitment to the Nato alliance. "Look, Nato has taken advantage of our country. The European countries took advantage."
During his first term from 2017 to 2021, Mr Trump repeatedly clashed with traditional allies over trade and defence spending.
Mr Trump's town hall, counter-programming to a debate he spurned between his rivals for the nomination, Ms Haley and Florida governor Ron DeSantis, took place just hours after former New Jersey governor Chris Christie ended his bid.
Mr Christie had failed to gain momentum in a campaign centred on fierce criticism of Mr Trump's policies and character, and Mr Trump was asked whether he would consider him for a running mate.
"I don't see it," he said. "That would be an upset, Christie for vice president."
Trump holds a commanding lead
Mr Trump retains a commanding lead in the contest to be the party's nominee against president Joe Biden in the November 5th election, according to a nationwide Reuters/Ipsos poll completed on Tuesday. The poll put him at 49 per cent, ahead of Ms Haley at 12 per cent and Mr DeSantis at 11 per cent.
Mr Trump said he was not worried that Mr Christie's support in New Hampshire - pegged at 12 per cent in a RealClearPolitics aggregate of poll numbers - might shift to Ms Haley, who sits at 29 per cent. Trump is in the lead at 43 per cent.
Mr Christie's base of support was greatly concentrated in New Hampshire, the northeastern US state that holds the second Republican nominating contest on January 23rd after Iowa on Monday.
"I'm not exactly worried about it," Mr Trump said. "I love the people. They love me, I think."
Mr Trump noted that Mr Christie was overheard on Wednesday predicting that Ms Haley was "gonna get smoked" in the race and was "not up to" the job of the presidency, saying he agreed with Mr Christie.
"I know her very well and I happen to believe that Chris Christie is right. That’s one of the few things he’s been right about actually," he said.
In their debate, Mr DeSantis and Ms Haley sought to emerge as the clear alternative to Mr Trump just days before the campaign's first votes are cast. But with the former president absent once again from the debate stage, the rivals focused much of their ammunition on each other, rather than Mr Trump, the frontrunner.
