Isaac Saul (19:34)
All right, that is it for what the left and the right are saying, which brings us to my take. So there's something interesting about the coverage here that I've noticed, which is most pundits are reacting to the final few minutes of this meeting, which obviously, you know, clearly was the most important. But I'd like to quickly recap a few things that happened before the now infamous blowup, because I think to really grasp how shocking the end of the meeting was, you have to watch the entire thing from start to finish, which I've done twice now, and both times I got a lot out of it. First of all, President Trump began this entire sit down by complimenting the bravery and courage of Ukraine's soldiers and of President Zelensky. He repeatedly committed to providing Ukraine with arms into the future. He even suggested we could, quote, unquote, conceivably commit U.S. troops on the ground in Ukraine alongside European troops, though that got almost zero press coverage because of what happened later. He referenced the long standing relationship between the two men. It's kind of memory hold now, but don't forget, Trump literally got impeached for attempting to pressure Zelensky into opening an investigation into the Biden family. These guys go pretty far back. Trump also repeatedly suggested the mineral rights deal would be signed that day and that a deal committing US Workers to mine mineral resources would ensure Ukraine's safety. He even said the US Would consider how to handle the Russian troops in occupied Ukrainian territory where some of the minerals are located. Russia is claiming the territory and also trying to leverage those minerals in a deal with the U.S. trump, unsurprisingly, also walked a line in the middle, painting Putin and Zelenskyy as two people who deeply dislike each other, rather than an aggressor and a victim. Trump also defended this tactic, making the argument that being nice to Putin was key to getting a deal on net, though it was a pretty warm reception for Zelensky and most importantly, Trump suggested several commitments for Ukraine. Still, through it all, there was some underlying tension. Both Zelenskyy and Trump endured some light prodding from each other and the reporters who were present. Brian Glenn, the conservative activist and boyfriend of Representative Marjorie Taylor Greene, the Republican from Georgia who now poses as a reporter in the Oval Office, asked Zelenskyy if he owned a suit and why he wasn't wearing one. Zelensky didn't take the bait, only joking back that maybe one day he'll have a suit nicer than Glenn's. Trump patted Zelensky's back and told him he liked his outfit. Earlier that day, Trump too had made a joke about what Zelenskyy was wearing. A few minutes later, as Zelensky was thanking European allies for giving a lot to Ukraine, Trump interrupted him to claim the US has given more. Zelensky, in a joking tone, corrected him. The two sparred while laughing uncomfortably. For a moment, though, their underlying dispute was real. Zelenskyy, for what it's worth, is correct. And then they both moved on again. Another moment worth watching. A couple of times Zelenskyy interrupted Trump to make a point, like when Trump said Ukrainian cities have been destroyed and Zelenskyy said Trump needed to come to see how the Ukrainian people were enduring and carrying on again. The meeting carried some tension, maybe more than a typical meeting like this, but it really was quite conciliatory. And then it happened. Vance, asking to speak, said that President Biden talked tough on Putin before Putin invaded Ukraine and destroyed a large portion of the country. Which hey, points for explaining events as they actually happened. And then Vance said this the path to peace is maybe engaging in diplomacy. Zelensky perhaps seeing a moment to make a point, then politely ask permission to ask a question to Vance. Up to this point, it was mostly Zelenskyy and Trump talking with each other and reporters. Zelenskyy's English is a little rough sometimes, but I'm gonna just share a transcript that's kind of a cleaned up version of what he said of his question to Vance, which came to us courtesy of foreign policy.com He Putin occupied various parts of Ukraine in 2014. During that time it was President Obama, then President Trump, then President Biden, and now it's President Trump and he will stop him referring to Putin. But during 2014 nobody stopped him. He just occupied and took. He killed people. From 2014 till 2022, the situation was the same. People have been dying on the contact line and nobody stopped him. Zelenskyy said. We had a lot of conversations with him, including a bilateral conversation. As a new president in 2019, I signed with him a ceasefire deal alongside Macron and Merkel. All of them told me that he will never go. We also signed a gas contract with him, but after all that, he broke the ceasefire, he killed our people, and he didn't exchange prisoners. We signed the exchange of prisoners, but he didn't do it. What kind of diplomacy, jd, are you speaking about? What do you mean? And that was it. That was what set Vance off, who responded by arguing that it was disrespectful for Zelenskyy to litigate this in front of the US media while forcing conscripts in Ukraine to the front lines and demanding that Zelensky say thank you to the President for trying to bring an end to the conflict. Zelensky, now clearly running hot, suggested the US has trouble recruiting soldiers in time of war too, which is true, and then asked Vance what he could know about Ukraine when he's never even visited. This, by the way, was news to me, but apparently is true and not something the vice President denied. Vance said he's watched and seen the stories and that visits to Ukraine are just propaganda tours. And with that, we were off the rails. By the time it was all said and done, Trump was yelling that Zelenskyy didn't have the cards, interjecting about Hunter Biden's bathroom and the Russia hoax, and suggesting Zelenskyy was acting like a tough guy only because of Trump's help. To state the obvious, Zelenskyy's crime, his catastrophically offensive move, was pointing out the reality that Putin broke a ceasefire in 2014 and many others since, and that it is actually not easy to just do diplomacy with a despotic authoritarian hell bent on turning 40 million free Ukrainians into his subjects. I cannot imagine how infuriating it must have been to be in Zelenskyy's shoes, listening to Vance smugly suggest this idea. It is novel, as if it hasn't been tried, as if Biden and Zelenskyy are idiots for never trying to just talk to Putin. Zelenskyy did sign ceasefire deals born of diplomacy with Putin, and he got invaded for it. Thousands dead, millions displaced, and, yes, many cities destroyed. It's a miracle Zelenskyy is even alive. Vance, who in this same meeting had just been cheering on the virtues of free speech, was apparently so incensed that Zelenskyy would use this moment to ask a pointed question or to litigate the issue in front of the press as that the entire meeting came crashing down. Litigating the issue, it should be said, is part of Zelenskyy's job. Ukraine's president knows his country is in dire need of help. He came to Washington hoping to finalize a deal exchanging Ukrainian natural resources for US Military support. But he saw a chance to speak directly to the US People, too. Let me also be very clear about this. Zelenskyy screwed up. Just last Thursday, I described Zelenskyy as good at international politics. That take did not age well after Friday. Anyone who knows anything about this administration knows you should come in, kiss the ring, sign the deal and leave. Trump is not a hard person to navigate. He's kind to people who compliment and respect him. This meeting again was going well. Trump was being friendly, saying all the right things, all the things Zelenskyy wanted to hear, and making important commitments. Zelenskyy was on the one yard line to get it done, and he blew it by picking a fight with the less important person he was sitting across from. But I also don't want to put all the agency on Zelenskyy either. Vance just as easily could have taken a cue from his boss and shrugged off Zelenskyy's question. He could have even used the opening to do the typical Trump worship now commonplace for the vice president. Yes, nobody believes striking this deal is going to be easy, but we're fortunate to have the greatest negotiator on earth. Boom. Done. Why is that so hard? I'll also confess that there is one other element underlying this meeting that made me more sympathetic to Zelenskyy. President Biden had been pouring the support on Ukraine, and Trump campaigned on ending that support. Vance also ran on the platform of ending aid to Ukraine for a Senate seat in 2022. In other words, Trump and Vance have each spent years making the public case that our support for Ukraine should stop, while also taking credit for that support, while also demanding Zelensky thank them for the support they are actively undermining. Gratitude, by the way he's expressed over and over in a sick twist of irony, this meeting up until the blowup was maybe the most unambiguously supportive of Ukraine I've ever heard. Trump, to strike an analogy, it'd be like getting a new boss at work who simultaneously criticizes everything you do while also demanding you be grateful to them for all the things your previous boss did for you. It is deeply manipulative. I say all this as someone who just last week defended Trump and Vance and wrote enthusiastically about the framework for this deal. I also say this as someone who would have given Trump an A for the first 40 minutes of this meeting, given how focused he seemed on a peace deal and how many little moments with Zelenskyy he just let go. Instead, it ended in disaster because of an unnecessary escalation to an unneeded pointed question. I really don't know what will happen now. Zelenskyy obviously still wants the deal. The Ukrainian people seem to support how he comported himself, even if they understand it may have been damaging. If Trump and Vance really do decide to end our support for Ukraine and pull out of this deal, Zelenskyy's actions will go down as one of the most catastrophic diplomatic failures I've ever seen. And for us, it'll be little more than a national disgrace. As Trump himself said on Friday, we shouldn't play games with World War Three. That message is applied just as well to Ukraine's leader as it does to our foreign we'll be right back after this quick break.