Trump will meet German Chancellor Merz at the White House. Here's what to know

German Chancellor Friedrich Merz attends a news conference at the chancellery in Berlin, May 28. Markus Schreiber/AP hide caption

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Markus Schreiber/AP

BERLIN — German Chancellor Friedrich Merz will visit the White House on Thursday for a meeting with President Trump that's expected to tackle the conflicts in Ukraine and the Middle East, as well as tariffs and trade.

While they have spoken by phone several times in recent weeks, this is Merz's first trip to Washington since becoming Germany's chancellor in May.

With the largest economy in the European Union, Germany is eager to deescalate trade tensions with the United States as a July 9 deadline looms on the Trump administration's threatened 50% tariffs on imports from the EU. The 27-country bloc says it is preparing "countermeasures" in response.

President Trump has often criticized Germany especially over trade and defense. "In his logic, Europe takes advantage of the United States, both in terms of its security umbrella, but also because of its economic prowess in the world," says political scientist Cathryn Clüver Ashbrook, executive vice president of the Bertelsmann Stiftung, an independent think tank based in northern Germany.

"Merz has to prove that what he is seeking is a truly collaborative relationship with this administration," she says, "but that also he will not stand for the image of Germany as a country that does not give back, either to the international community or to the trans-Atlantic relationship."

Clüver Ashbrook says this could prove to be a challenge for Merz, a 69-year-old conservative former banker who has only been chancellor for a month. The meeting follows visits this year by Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy and South African President Cyril Ramaphosa, who found themselves under verbal attacks by Trump in the Oval Office. Other European leaders such as French President Emmanuel Macron and British Prime Minister Keir Starmer had cordial receptions at the White House.

"Friedrich Merz is not known to hold back his emotions, and yet this is a high-stakes diplomatic play for him," says Clüver Ashbrook, "and I would hope that his team has made him aware of the more confrontational elements that might be part of this conversation."

Since he became chancellor on May 6, Merz has plunged into diplomatic efforts to secure a ceasefire between Russia and Ukraine and to maintain Western support for Kyiv. On Wednesday, he hosted Ukrainian President Zelenskyy in Berlin.

Merz has also freed up hundreds of billions of dollars in the national budget to build up Germany's military — a past point of contention for President Trump, who has criticized the amount Germany and other NATO allies spend on defense while depending on the U.S. security umbrella, which includes several military bases in Germany.