By an overwhelming majority of votes, the Lower House of the US Parliament passed a bill that prohibits the US President Donald Trump to use public funds to exit the North Atlantic Alliance, Defense News reports.

Both opposing parties showed unanimity – 357 members of the House of Representatives voted for the bill” in defense of NATO”, 22 – against.

According to the website of the Congress, the draft was submitted to the Parliament on January 17. Already on January 22 it was put to the vote. According to the website of the Congress, the procedure of its adoption took exactly half an hour. In order to become a law, the draft must still pass a vote in the Senate, and then it must be signed by the President.

The bill was introduced in the lower house the day after the New York Times published another article with leaks from the Trump camp. This time it was about the President’s desire to return to the idea of withdrawal from NATO.

According to sources, which traditionally remain anonymous, during 2018 trump several times privately declared his desire to withdraw from NATO. The American leader told senior national security officials that “there is no point in a military alliance.”

Since the election race, trump has repeatedly demanded that NATO allies bear a financial burden proportional to the US and increase defense spending to at least 2% of GDP. European leaders generally did not protest, but said that it is impossible to do quickly and military spending should be increased gradually.