President Donald Trump landed in Scotland on Friday and promptly reignited his war on windmills.
The president, who despises the wind farm next to his golf course near Aberdeen, once again raged against wind energy while on the tarmac at Glasgow’s Prestwick Airport.
“Stop the windmills! You are ruining your countries. I really mean it,“ he told reporters after facing questions about the ongoing Jeffrey Epstein controversy.
“It’s so sad. You fly over and you see the windmills all over the place ruining your beautiful fields and valleys and killing your birds, and—if they are stuck in the ocean—ruining your oceans," he went on.
It is just a few weeks since Trump last criticized the structures—but he has been annoyed by them for years.
In 2019, he claimed (without evidence) that windmills cause cancer.
In 2012, he was posting online (again without evidence) about “bird-killing wind turbines” that the Chinese were “illegally dumping” offshore.
But Trump’s obsession seems to stem from 2006, when the Aberdeen Renewable Energy Group was constructing an offshore wind farm near his golf course that was still being developed.
“With the reckless installation of these monsters, you will single-handedly have done more damage to Scotland than virtually any event in Scottish history,” Trump wrote in an angry letter to Alex Salmond, Scotland’s first minister at the time.
“I have just authorized my staff to allocate a substantial amount of money to launch an international campaign to fight your plan to surround Scotland’s coast with many thousands of wind turbines,” Trump continued.
The golf course was ultimately built, but so too were 11 turbines. Trump had tried to prevent it, arguing that the wind farm spoiled views from the resort.
In 2019, a court ruled against the American president, adding that the Trump International Golf Club Scotland Ltd must pay the Scottish government’s legal bills.
According to the Scottish government, Scotland now generates more energy than it needs from renewable resources, exporting the surplus across the United Kingdom.
Trump’s multi-day trip to Great Britain that began Friday will include a visit to his other course in Scotland, Trump Turnberry. He will also open a new course bearing the name of his mother, Mary Anne MacLeod Trump, who was born in Tong, Scotland, on the Outer Hebridean island of Lewis.
Trump told reporters he also plans to meet with British Prime Minister Keir Starmer and European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen during his four-day trip.
