MSNBC's "Morning Joe" co-host Joe Scarborough said that President Donald Trump's speech in Poland on Thursday was "extremely disappointing" for anybody trying to score policy points.
"You know the first half of this speech was packed with platitudes and trite, obvious talking points and it was an extremely disappointing speech for anyone hoping to get policy points out of it," Scarborough said.
Scarborough shifted to the latter part of the speech, where he said that Trump made some significant points.
"The first significant note was he said that the bonds between the United States and Europe are as strong as ever and possibly even stronger than ever. He even made a passing negative reference to Russia," Scarborough noted.
Scarborough said one of the big takeaways from Trump's speech was his support for the Article Five provision of the NATO treaty, which he noted was not in one of Trump's previous speeches before NATO leaders in May.
"Despite the slow start, despite the platitudes, there actually is a good bit of news, and I would say positive news for our European allies that were packed in the final 10 minutes of this speech," Scarborough said.
Richard Haass said that Trump's speech was "tedious" and "needed serious editing," but he agreed with Scarborough that there was a clear affirmation of NATO's Article Five, under which member states pledge to defend one another if attacked. He also noted that it was significant that Russia was singled out and criticized in a sentence for its destabilizing activities in eastern Ukraine.
Trump is on the second overseas trip of his presidency, and will be participating in the G20 Summit in Hamburg, Germany, where he will meet with German Chancellor Angela Merkel and have a one-on-one meeting with Russian President Vladimir Putin.
UPDATED 11:34 A.M.: A previous version of this article erroneously stated that Trump asserted his support for Article Five of the United Nations in his speech, rather than the NATO treaty.
3:31 P.M.: The article earlier referred to Richard Haass as former U.N. Ambassador Richard Holbrooke.