Jennifer Bowers Bahney at Mediaite:
Critics branded President Donald Trump “an embarrassment” for declaring that Vladimir Putin wanted to see Ukraine “succeed,” even as Russian troops continued to unleash on Kiev.
After meeting with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky for a much-hyped peace summit at Mar-a-Lago on Sunday, Trump said no deal had been reached, but they’re “very close.”
Trump also claimed that Russia will help with reconstruction after peace is finally achieved.
“Russia wants to see Ukraine succeed,” Trump told reporters. “It sounds a little strange but I was explaining to the president, President Putin was very generous in his feeling toward Ukraine succeeding. Including supplying energy, electricity, and other things at very low prices.”
Not everyone was buying Trump’s claim, though.
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The Bulwark’s Sarah Longwell wrote, “Whenever I truly want my neighbor to succeed, I break into his house, brutalize his family, steal his children, and burn his house to the ground while screaming, ‘bro, I’m just trying to help!’”
Longwell added, “Our president is an international calamity.”
Ukrainian commentator @BohuslavskaKate wrote, “About the press conference: Trump is absolutely detached from reality. He doesn’t understand how to end this war or what he is doing. But he visibly enjoys bragging about his relationship with Putin and their sweet phone calls in front of [Zelensky]. To him, it’s a kind of power flex, but in reality he is simply admiring a war criminal in front of the president of the victim nation. It doesn’t looks powerful, it looks sadistic and dumb.”
