Trump's Election Speech: Malevolence Tempered by Incompetence

Our most recent book is The Comeback: The 2024 Elections and American Politics. The second Trump administration has been full of ominous developments. 

David E. Sanger and Dustin Volz:

For years, President Trump has offered a hodgepodge of conspiracy theories and baseless charges to support his falsehood that the 2020 election was stolen from him, and that America’s election system was hijacked by a combination of outside powers and “deep state” insiders.

But when he declassified a raft of intelligence reports, hastily drafted emails between officials at the F.B.I. and other agencies, and formal “assessments” late Thursday, he was unable to prove his case.

An examination of the more than 270 pages of evidence released by the White House supports the broad conclusions already announced in 2020 and 2021, albeit with some finer details. For example, China considered modest attempts to influence opinion in the United States, and downloaded publicly available voter rolls from several states, but never manipulated a single voting machine or ballot.

Even new assertions, such as a document from the Department of Homeland Security claiming to have found more than 250,000 noncitizens registered in California, New Jersey, Nevada and Pennsylvania, came devoid of supporting evidence and immediately was met with pushback from state officials.

 

The documents are so damning in refuting Trump's own case that I wonder if anyone in the White House actually read them (or understood what they were looking at) https://t.co/8jUP0zVMTp

— Tom Nichols (@RadioFreeTom) July 17, 2026

Trump Gloats About Mueller's Death

 Our books have discussed Trump's low character, which was on display this weekend.

pic.twitter.com/sd3OJOQybo

— Rapid Response 47 (@RapidResponse47) March 21, 2026

In 2016, Trump asked Russia to hack Hillary Clinton's emails  As the Mueller report note,  the Russian military quckly did has he had asked.  From the Mueller report.

Trump later claimed that he was just kidding.  He was not. When reporter Katy Tur asked him if the request gave him pause, he said, "It gives me no pause."  When she pressed him, he told her, "Be quiet."

Spit Take: Trump Says Russia Wants Ukraine to Succeed

Our new book is The Comeback: The 2024 Elections and American Politics. The second Trump administration has been full of ominous developments.

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.

...

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.”

No, Trump is Definitely Not Reagan's Heir

Our new book is The Comeback: The 2024 Elections and American Politics. The second Trump administration has been full of ominous developments. Pete Hegseth's tenure is one of them.

David McAfee at Raw Story:

Hegseth over the weekend made a simple comment when he said, "If you look at actual policies, Donald Trump is the true and rightful heir of Ronald Reagan."

The statement didn't go over well with critics.

Attorney Danny Miller simply quoted Reagan as saying, “Freedom is never more than one generation away from extinction. We didn't pass it to our children in the bloodstream. It must be fought for, protected, and handed on for them to do the same, or one day we will spend our sunset years telling our children and our children's children what it was once like in the United States where men were free.”

Conservative Heath Mayo chimed in with, "No serious person believes this. Reagan helped *win* the Cold War. He invested in freedom and peace. He knew it mattered, and that it wasn’t a waste or a 'territorial dispute.' And it’s frankly embarrassing that the Reagan Foundation and the 'Reagan National Defense Forum' would give this guy a microphone."

"He’s not worth the time of serious people, despite his title. I would have walked out," Mayo added.

Another conservative analyst, Tom Nichols chimed in with, "Yeah, no."Independent veteran leader Paul Rieckhoff said, "Hegseth is the only person who believes this."

Another conservative analyst, Tom Nichols chimed in with, "Yeah, no."

Independent veteran leader Paul Rieckhoff said, "Hegseth is the only person who believes this."

Reagan supported robust immigration, free trade, and a tough stance on the Kremlin.  Trump's policies are the opposite.

Here is Reagan on the moral stakes of foreign policy: "Yes, let us pray for the salvation of all of those who live in that totalitarian darkness -- pray they will discover the joy of knowing God. But until they do, let us be aware that while they preach the supremacy of the state, declare its omnipotence over individual man, and predict its eventual domination of all peoples on the Earth, they are the focus of evil in the modern world."

Trump's national security strategy: “We seek good relations and peaceful commercial relations with the nations of the world without imposing on them democratic or other social change that differs widely from their traditions and histories.”

Kremlin spokesman Peskov: Adjustments to the U.S. National Security Strategy largely align with our own vision.

🔗 Source: https://t.co/fkc1rZJ13Q pic.twitter.com/AadbDEHBVw

— Russia Direct (@RussiaDirect_) December 7, 2025

Selling Out Ukraine

Our new book is The Comeback: The 2024 Elections and American Politics. The second Trump administration has been full of ominous developments.

Drew Hinshaw et al. at WSJ:

Three powerful businessmen—two Americans and a Russian—hunched over a laptop in Miami Beach last month, ostensibly to draw up a plan to end Russia’s long and deadly war with Ukraine.

But the full scope of their project went much further, according to people familiar with the talks. They were privately charting a path to bring Russia’s $2 trillion economy in from the cold—with American businesses first in line to beat European competitors to the dividends.

At his waterfront estate, billionaire developer-turned-special envoy Steve Witkoff was hosting Kirill Dmitriev, head of Russia’s sovereign-wealth fund and Vladimir Putin’s handpicked negotiator, who had largely shaped the document they were revising on the screen. Jared Kushner, the president’s son-in-law, had arrived from his nearby home on an island known as the “Billionaire Bunker.”

Dmitriev was pushing a plan for U.S. companies to tap the roughly $300 billion of Russian central bank assets, frozen in Europe, for U.S.-Russian investment projects and a U.S.-led reconstruction of Ukraine. U.S. and Russian companies could join to exploit the vast mineral wealth in the Arctic. There were no limits to what two longtime adversaries could achieve, Dmitriev had argued for months: Their rival space industries, which raced one another during the Cold War, could even pursue a joint mission to Mars with Elon Musk’s SpaceX.

For the Kremlin, the Miami talks were the culmination of a strategy, hatched before Trump’s inauguration, to bypass the traditional U.S. national security apparatus and convince the administration to view Russia not as a military threat but as a land of bountiful opportunity, according to Western security officials. By dangling multibillion-dollar rare-earth and energy deals, Moscow could reshape the economic map of Europe—while driving a wedge between America and its traditional allies.

Foreign MAGA

Our new book is The Comeback: The 2024 Elections and American Politics. The second Trump administration is has been full of ominous developments.  For one, we have learned that foreign interference in American politics has not gone away.

Marina Dunbar at The Guardian:

Many of the most influential personalities in the “Make America great again” (Maga) movement on X are based outside of the US, including Russia, Nigeria and India, a new transparency feature on the social media site has revealed.

The new tool, called “about this account”, became available on Friday to users of the Elon Musk-owned platform. It allows anyone to see where an account is located, when it joined the platform, how often its username has been changed, and how the X app was downloaded.

As soon as the update was rolled out, users found numerous Maga and rightwing influencers who presented themselves as patriotic Americans were operating from other countries.

“This is easily one of the greatest days on this platform,” wrote the liberal influencer Harry Sisson. “Seeing all of these MAGA accounts get exposed as foreign actors trying to destroy the United States is a complete vindication of Democrats, like myself and many on here, who have been warning about this.”

The account MAGANationX, with nearly 400,000 followers and a bio reading “Patriot Voice for We The People”, is actually operated from eastern Europe, according to the Daily Beast. Another popular profile, IvankaNews, an Ivanka Trump fan account with about 1 million followers that frequently posts about illegal immigration, Islam and support for Trump, was revealed to be based in Nigeria.

Another user also uncovered several additional cases. Dark Maga, a smaller account with roughly 15,000 followers, is run from Thailand. MAGA Scope, which has more than 51,000 followers, operates out of Nigeria, while MAGA Beacon is based in south Asia.

Miles Klee at Rolling Stone:

A user with the handle @AmericanGuyX, for example, who represents themselves as a “Florida guy,” regularly posted in support of Trump and Musk while denouncing figures including George Soros and fear-mongering about the U.S. national debt. Their location, according to X, is India. On Saturday, Trump shared an X post from @TRUMP_ARMY_ about a Supreme Court ruling on Truth Social; that person, who has more than half a million followers, also lives in India. And a now-suspended account with the handle @American and a profile image of a bald eagle superimposed on an American flag traced back to Pakistan.

Other accounts featuring MAGA slogans, American flag emojis, references to the American Revolution, and Trump-favored words such as “patriot” were found to be run by users in places including Nigeria, Turkey, Ukraine, Thailand, and the United Kingdom. Quite a few have substantial followings and at some point alluded to voting for Trump in 2024 despite evidently lacking U.S. citizenship. There was evidence, too, that more of these inauthentic profiles are springing up every day and often rebranding to gain a wider audience. The MAGA account “Charlie’s Voice Rising,” or @CharlieK_news, which uses an avatar of slain right-wing activist Charlie Kirk and has nearly 200,000 followers, was created less than a year ago by someone in Eastern Europe, and the handle has been changed multiple times.

 

Bad November for Trump

Our new book is The Comeback: The 2024 Elections and American Politics. The second Trump administration is has been full of ominous developments.

Chris Megerian at AP:

Thanksgiving may not provide Trump with much political respite after Democrats won sweeping victories in New Jersey, Virginia and elsewhere earlier this month. Some research indicates that holiday meals could cost more this year , despite the president’s insistence otherwise , a reminder of persistent frustration with elevated prices.

Meanwhile, Trump is struggling to advance a plan to end the Russian invasion of Ukraine after an earlier version faced swift criticism from European allies and even some Republicans. The U.S. military is also poised to target Venezuela with military strikes, part of an anti-drug operation that could ultimately destabilize the country’s leadership. [CBS poll finds 70% would oppose an attack on Venezuela.]

In Washington, Trump faces the possibility of a splintering Republican coalition ahead of next year’s midterm elections, which will determine control of Congress. Some members of his party already took the rare step of crossing the president by successfully pushing legislation to force the Justice Department to release more documents about the Jeffrey Epstein case.

Trump faced a setback in court this week when a federal judge tossed cases against James Comey and Letitia James, two targets of the president’s retribution campaign.

It Sounds Better in the Original Russian

Our new book is The Comeback: The 2024 Elections and American Politics. The second Trump administration is has been full of ominous developments.

Associated Press:

Lawmakers critical of President Donald Trump’s approach to ending the Russia-Ukraine war said Saturday they spoke with Secretary of State Marco Rubio who told them that the peace plan Trump is pushing Kyiv to accept is a “wish list” of the Russians and not the actual proposal offering Washington’s positions.

A State Department spokesperson denied their account, calling it “blatantly false.”

Rubio himself then took the extraordinary step of suggesting online that the senators were mistaken, even though they said he was their source for the information. The secretary of state doubled down on the assertion that Washington was responsible for a proposal that had surprised many from the beginning for being so favorable to Moscow.

It all added up to a confusing — and potentially embarrassing — turn of events for a Trump administration-blessed peace plan that already faced a potentially rocky future.

The widely leaked 28-point U.S-backed peace plan was, according to the White House, the result of a month of work between Rubio and Trump envoy Steve Witkoff along with input from what it said was both Ukrainians and Russians. The plan acquiesces to many Russian demands that Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy has categorically rejected on dozens of occasions, including giving up large pieces of territory. Trump says he wants Ukraine to accept the plan by late next week.

“This administration was not responsible for this release in its current form,” said Republican Mike Rounds from South Dakota, speaking at a security conference in Canada. “They want to utilize it as a starting point.”

Rounds said “it looked more like it was written in Russian to begin with.”

Rounds was not kidding.  Hafiz Rashid at TNR:

The U.S. peace plan presented to Ukraine appears to have been translated from Russian.

The syntax of certain phrases are more common in the Russian language, such as the third point of the 28-point plan: “It is expected that Russia will not invade neighbouring countries and Nato will not expand further.”

“It is expected” is not commonly used in English, but it is common in Russian and appears to come from the phrase ожидается or ozhidayetsya, according to The Guardian’s Luke Harding. Other words that appear to be translated from Russian include “ambiguities” (неоднозначности) and “to enshrine” (закрепить).

It’s no accident, either: The plan was hammered out by President Trump’s envoy Steve Witkoff and Kirill Dmitriev, an adviser to Russian President Vladimir Putin, after the two met last month in Miami. While Secretary of State Marco Rubio was also involved, no Ukrainian or European officials were, which is pretty evident by its contents.

For example, under the proposal, Ukraine would cede Crimea, Luhansk, and Donetsk to Russia and would be banned from joining NATO. Russia would get readmitted to the G8. Ukraine would also reduce the size of its military by hundreds of thousands, and no NATO troops could be stationed in the country. Sanctions against Russia would also be lifted but would snap back if Russia invades Ukraine again.

Grok’s Conclusion:
“This document is almost certainly translated from Russian into English by a native Russian speaker or a non-professional translator. It is not originally written in English. pic.twitter.com/uNF7yup85n

— Meaghan Mobbs (@mobbs_mentality) November 22, 2025

ChatGPT confirms.: "This is almost certainly a translation, not originally written in English. The underlying source language was almost certainly Russian, with a possibility of Ukrainian, but the linguistic signals point more strongly to Russian → English translation."

Malevolence Compounded by Incompetence: Witkoff ed.

Our new book is The Comeback: The 2024 Elections and American Politics. The second Trump administration is has been full of ominous developments.

Felicia Schwartz at Politico:

President Donald Trump’s surprise Anchorage summit with Russian President Vladimir Putin could have been a signature achievement for Steve Witkoff, the developer-turned-diplomat who facilitated the meet up.

But promised follow-up meetings between Putin and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy have not materialized, ceasefire demands were dropped, threats of tough action have disappeared and Trump’s team has offered no clear road ahead.

Some frustrated U.S., Ukrainian and European officials say part of the problem is the go-it-alone style of Witkoff, Trump’s special envoy for peace missions and go-to negotiator on Ukraine. He has refused to consult with experts and allies, leaving him uninformed at times and unprepared at others, according to seven people familiar with internal discussions. Two said he misses the mark by viewing the conflict through a real estate lens, like a land dispute.

Trump’s unconventional fixer has met Putin five times over six months, but he has yet to translate his access to the Russian leader into any breakthroughs on Ukraine....“His inexperience shines through, he has the president’s ear, which is evident, but there has been some confusion about what has been said and agreed,” said a person familiar with the diplomatic effort.

...

“He’s kind of a rogue actor,” said a U.S. official familiar with Witkoff’s diplomatic style. “He talks to all these people, but no one knows what he says in any of these meetings. He will say things publicly but then he changes his mind. It’s hard to operationalize that.”

Witkoff’s Washington office is sparsely staffed, and short on people with Russia expertise or experienced in complex diplomatic negotiations. And he has refused to do typical consultations with Russia and Ukraine experts in and outside of government, according to the five people familiar with internal discussions.

 

Like Ellis in Die Hard, he thinks he’s a clever negotiator but he has no clue that he’s dealing with a stone killer. https://t.co/UkmpjDcqJI

— Jack Pitney (@jpitney) August 18, 2025

Blasts from the Past

 Our new book is The Comeback: The 2024 Elections and American Politics. The second Trump administration is on an ominous course.  In the Anchorage summit, Trump literally rolled out the red carpet for Putin and got nothing.

This is all about American weakness and an incompetent President.

— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) September 13, 2012

Putin has shown the world what happens when America has weak leaders. Peace Through Strength!

— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) April 28, 2014

Putin has no respect for our President --- really bad body language.

— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) June 19, 2012

A Good Week for Gavin Newsom

 Our new book is The Comeback: The 2024 Elections and American Politics. The second Trump administration is on an ominous course.  In the Anchorage summit, Trump literally rolled out the red carpet for Putin and got nothing. In California, Democrats have drafted their countermander.

 

🚨🚨 The final draft map from the California state legislature is now public.

Our partisanship index (2024/2020 presidential results composite) shows:
🔵 48 Democratic seats (+5)
🔴 4 Republican seats (-5) pic.twitter.com/StPeUKEk6V

— VoteHub (@VoteHubUS) August 16, 2025

TRUMP JUST FLED THE PODIUM WITH PUTIN — NO QUESTIONS, NOTHING! TOTAL LOW ENERGY. THE MAN LOOKED LIKE HE’D JUST EATEN 3 BUCKETS OF KFC WITH VLAD. IS HE AFRAID THE PRESS WILL ASK ABOUT ME??? (AMERICA’S FAVORITE GOVERNOR) AND THE FACT I "STOLE THE CAMERAS" THIS WEEK WITH “THE MAPS”?…

— Governor Newsom Press Office (@GovPressOffice) August 15, 2025

Russiagate Redux

Our new book is The Comeback: The 2024 Elections and American Politics. The second Trump administration is off to an ominous start.

Trump is using wild conspiracy theories to distract from the mounting Epstein scandal.

Charlie Savage and Adam Goldman at NYT:

The Trump-era special counsel who scoured the Russia investigation for wrongdoing gathered evidence that undermines a theory pushed by some Republicans that Hillary Clinton’s campaign conspired to frame Donald J. Trump for colluding with Moscow in the 2016 election, information declassified on Thursday shows.

The information, a 29-page annex to the special counsel’s 2023 report, reveals that a foundational document for that theory was most likely stitched together by Russian spies. The document is a purported email from July 27, 2016, that said Mrs. Clinton had approved a campaign proposal to tie Mr. Trump to Russia to distract from the scandal over her use of a private email server.

The release of the annex adds new details to the public’s understanding of a complex trove of 2016 Russian intelligence reports analyzing purported emails that Russian hackers stole from Americans. It also shows how the special counsel, John H. Durham, went to great lengths to try to prove that several of the emails were real, only to ultimately conclude otherwise.

The declassification is the latest disclosure in recent weeks concerning the Russia investigation. The wave has come as the administration is seeking to change the subject from its broken promise to release files related to the disgraced financier Jeffrey Epstein.

Even as the releases shed more light on a seismic political period nearly a decade ago, Mr. Trump and his allies have wildly overstated what the documents show, accusing former President Barack Obama of “treason.”

The release of the annex was no exception. John Ratcliffe, the C.I.A. director, said in a statement that the materials proved that suspicions of Russian collusion stemmed from “a coordinated plan to prevent and destroy Donald Trump’s presidency.”

And Kash Patel, the F.B.I. director, who has a long history of pushing false claims about the Russia investigation, declared on social media that the annex revealed “evidence that the Clinton campaign plotted to frame President Trump and fabricate the Russia collusion hoax.”


In reality, the annex shows the opposite, indicating that a key piece of supposed evidence for the claim that Mrs. Clinton approved a plan to tie Mr. Trump to Russia is not credible: Mr. Durham concluded that the email from July 27, 2016, and a related one dated two days earlier were probably manufactured.

Re those Hillary conspiracy emails: if a native English speaker wrote this, I'll eat Kash Patel's MAGA hat
("pour oil into the fire" is literal translation from Russian idiom, dumbasses: "podlit' masla v ogon'") pic.twitter.com/Ym0bJ2jK8v

— Cathy Young 🇺🇸🇺🇦🇮🇱🇬🇪 (@CathyYoung63) August 1, 2025

Gabbard Lies to Divert Attention from the Epstein Scandal

Our new book is The Comeback: The 2024 Elections and American Politics. The second Trump administration is off to an ominous start.

Trump is using wild conspiracy theories to distract from the mounting Epstein scandal.

Dan De Luce at NBC:

The former senior CIA officer who helped oversee the 2017 intelligence assessment on Russia’s interference in the 2016 election says Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard and the White House are “lying” when they claim that it was an attempt to sabotage President Donald Trump.

Susan Miller, a retired CIA officer who helped lead the team that produced the report about Russia’s actions during the 2016 campaign, told NBC News it was based on credible information that showed Moscow sought to help Trump win the election, but that there was no sign of a conspiracy between the Kremlin and the Trump campaign.

“The director of national intelligence and the White House are lying, again,” Miller said. “We definitely had the intel to show with high probability that the specific goal of the Russians was to get Trump elected.”

She added: “At the same time, we found no two-way collusion between Trump or his team with the Russians at that time.”Miller spoke to NBC News after Gabbard alleged Wednesday that the 2017 intelligence assessment was based on “manufactured” information as part of a “treasonous conspiracy” by the Obama administration to undermine Trump and tarnish his electoral victory. Gabbard cited a 2020 report from Republicans on the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence, which she declassified and released this week, that asserted there was insufficient information to conclude Russia had been trying to tip the scales in favor of Trump.

More details at AP 

Russia, Russia, Russia

 Our forthcoming book is The Comeback: The 2024 Elections and American Politics. The second Trump administration is off to an ominous start.

Benedict Smith at The Telegraph:

A senior official who dismantled the US government’s Russian disinformation unit is married to a Russian woman with links to the Kremlin, The Telegraph can reveal.

Darren Beattie has provoked alarm within the State Department since being appointed in February for his ardent pro-Russian views and focus on destroying the agency tasked with tackling Kremlin propaganda.

Mr Beattie, the acting under-secretary for public diplomacy and public affairs, is married to a woman whose uncle has taken several roles in Russian politics and once received a personal “thank you” message from Vladimir Putin.

In the years before joining the government, Mr Beattie wrote social media posts suggesting Western institutions should be “infiltrated” by Putin, while he also attacked what he described as the “globalist American empire”.

Donald Trump is under pressure from many in his party, particularly senators, to take a tougher stance on the Russian leader while he continues to refuse to sign a ceasefire deal as the war in Ukraine drags on.

Many of Mr Beattie’s social media posts also concern China, repeatedly calling on the US to surrender Taiwan to Beijing, and labelling Britain a “poor and pathetic kingdom” that would be “far better off under Chinese dominion”.

Trump referred to Putin's invasion of Ukraine as a "genius" move.  Silence on an actual genius move: Ukraine's amazing drone attack deep into Russian territory.

Michael Luciano at Mediaite:

Leavitt took questions outside the White House on Monday, where she reiterated Trump’s position that Putin and Zelensky should speak directly with each other. One reporter brought up Ukraine’s shocking drone attack on Russian warplanes deep inside Russian territory.

“What was the president’s reaction to that Ukrainian drone attack – stunning drone attack – on Russian airbases?” he asked. “What’s his reaction?”

“Well, look,” Leavitt replied. “The reaction is this war needs to come to an end. And this war has been brutal from both sides. Too many people have died, and the president wants this war to end at the negotiating table. And he’s made that clear to both leaders, both publicly and privately.”

 

Trump and Putin

Our forthcoming book is The Comeback: The 2024 Elections and American Politics. The second Trump administration is off to an ominous start.  Trump is giving Putin nearly everything he could want.

Andrew Roth and Luke Harding at The Guardian:

Donald Trump has said Vladimir Putin was “doing what anybody would do” after Russia launched a massive missile and drone strike on Ukraine days after the US cut off vital intelligence and military aid to Kyiv.

Speaking to reporters in the Oval Office on Friday Trump said he finds it “easier” to work with Russia than Ukraine and that Putin “wants to end the war”.

“I’m finding it more difficult, frankly, to deal with Ukraine. And they don’t have the cards,” Trump said. “In terms of getting a final settlement, it may be easier dealing with Russia.”

Asked whether the Russian leader was taking advantage of the pause in US intelligence sharing and military aid to Ukraine, Trump replied: “I actually think he is doing what anybody else would do.”

 Mark Mazzetti at NYT:

In early 2017, American intelligence agencies delivered an unequivocal judgment about why President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia had ordered a sprawling effort to sabotage the recent American presidential election.

Mr. Putin wanted to cripple the faith Americans have in their own elections, they found, and to undermine a United States-led “liberal world order” that the Russians see as a threat to their security. As a way to achieve this goal, the assessment found, Russia worked to help Donald J. Trump win the election.

Eight years later, Mr. Trump sat in the Oval Office for a blustery meeting with President Voldymyr Zelensky of Ukraine and rendered, once again, his own judgment on that period. There was no Russian sabotage, just a “phony witch hunt” of which both he and Mr. Putin were victims.

“Let me tell you, Putin went through a hell of a lot with me,” he said.

The statement was a tell. The president sees common cause with Mr. Putin, a merging of interests forged through battles against those he believes are his and Mr. Putin’s mutual adversaries — including Democratic lawmakers, European leaders and a spectral “deep state” inside the U.S. government.

...

This is a world turned upside down for Susan Miller, the former head of counterintelligence at the C.I.A., who led the agency’s 2017 intelligence assessment on Russian election interference.

Ms. Miller said in an interview that she thinks Mr. Trump’s affinity for the Russian president boils down to “autocrat envy”— that he covets the power Mr. Putin has to make decisions in Russia without any constraints.

“Trump likes Putin because Putin has control over his country,” she said. “And Trump wants control over his country.”

Russia's Man in Washington

Our forthcoming book is The Comeback: The 2024 Elections and American Politics. The second Trump administration is off to an ominous start.

Dave Lawler at Axios:

Breaking it down: Trump has made at least five Moscow-friendly moves just in the last two weeks.

1. The White House asked Treasury and State to identify sanctions on Russia that could be loosened as part of the process of improving relations, Reuters reports.Trump didn't deny that Monday, telling reporters: "We want to make deals with everybody."

2. Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth reportedly ordered U.S. Cyber Command to suspend offensive cyber and information operations against Russia.The suspension is intended to last as long as negotiations to end the Russia-Ukraine war play out, officials told the Washington Post.

3. Trump has called for elections in Ukraine, and he and his allies suggested after the Oval Office spat that Zelensky might need to go.Regime change in Kyiv was one of Putin's original objectives for invading. It remains unlikely he'll be able to install a Kremlin stooge any time soon. Still, Trump's comments denouncing Zelensky — and his moves to freeze him out after the meeting — have weakened the position of a leader the Kremlin has long sought to discredit internationally. Reality check: Ukraine has been under martial law since the invasion began, and its constitution does not allow for elections in such a scenario.

4. The U.S. voted with Russia and 16 other mostly authoritarian countries to oppose a UN resolution last week that condemned Russia's "aggression" in Ukraine.The Biden administration repeatedly used such votes to depict Russia as a pariah state. This time, the U.S. voted with Moscow and against nearly all its Western allies.

5. Suspending weapons shipments — which the Trump administration had already dramatically slowed — is the latest dramatic step.Billions of dollars of equipment committed under Biden were in different stages along the delivery pipeline, Axios' Sareen Habeshian reports.

If Trump and Company Were Russian Assets...

 ...would they be doing anything differently?

Our forthcoming book is The Comeback: The 2024 Elections and American Politics. The second Trump administration is off to an ominous start. Hewgseth weakens our defenses against Russia just as Gabbard repeats Russian talking points.  

Counterintelligence catastrophe: all the DoD’s operations, for every single employee at a granular level, collected at one time, at one email address. It would take billions of dollars and many years for an adversary to get this information, if even possible, through espionage. pic.twitter.com/QoBvAJttlm

— John Jackson (@hissgoescobra) March 2, 2025

Pete Hegseth just reportedly ordered the US military’s Cyber Command to “stand down” from all planning against Russia. Analysts have been ordered not to follow or report on Russian threats.

One inside source said, “Putin is on the inside now.” pic.twitter.com/2vnNoL6FcK

— No Lie with Brian Tyler Cohen (@NoLieWithBTC) March 2, 2025

The Washington Post confirms The Guardian's reporting (denied by DHS) that some CISA cyber-threat analysts have been told to "focus on adversaries other than Russia": https://t.co/pWUAFkF1qC

— Eric Geller (@ericgeller) March 2, 2025

"Churches are closing in Ukraine, elections are canceled, and the government fully controls the media" — U.S. Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard talking about 'values'.

This is exactly what Russian propaganda shows and the Kremlin are constantly spewing. pic.twitter.com/HVWbyWNP6w

— NOELREPORTS 🇪🇺 🇺🇦 (@NOELreports) March 3, 2025

Disgrace

Our forthcoming book is The Comeback: The 2024 Elections and American Politics. The second Trump administration is off to an ominous start.

 

Lindsey Graham represents everything wrong with our politics.
pic.twitter.com/25obiJpefD

— Republicans against Trump (@RpsAgainstTrump) March 2, 2025

Alexander Vindman: Lindsey Graham is an absolute coward. Trump didn’t sound strong—he was attacking an ally when he didn’t need to. All Zelenskyy said was that Trump couldn’t trust Putin. That was it. That’s how the argument started. And JD Vance—he looked like an absolute clown.… pic.twitter.com/CluYSY8eyy

— Acyn (@Acyn) March 1, 2025

Rubio in 2022: Vladimir Putin is a “cruel & evil butcher”

Rubio tonight: “I’m not going to fall into this trap of who is bad and who is evil” pic.twitter.com/BPSjGIMdWm

— FactPost (@factpostnews) March 1, 2025

#UPDATE Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said in remarks aired on Sunday that the United States's dramatic shift in foreign policy largely aligns with its own vision ➡️ https://t.co/duyjNjT85M pic.twitter.com/QN2uQ8QdLN

— AFP News Agency (@AFP) March 2, 2025

Betrayal

Our forthcoming book is The Comeback: The 2024 Elections and American Politics. The second Trump administration is off to an ominous start.

Anton Troianovski, Nataliya Vasilyeva and Paul Sonne

President Trump says he wants a quick cease-fire in Ukraine. But President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia appears to be in no rush, and the blowup on Friday between Mr. Trump and Ukraine’s president may give Russia’s leader the kind of ammunition he needs to prolong the fight.

With the American alliance with Ukraine suffering a dramatic, public rupture, Mr. Putin now seems even more likely to hold out for a deal on his terms — and he could even be tempted to expand his push on the battlefield.

The extraordinary scene in Washington — in which Mr. Trump lambasted President Volodymyr Zelensky of Ukraine — was broadcast as the top story on state television in Russia on Saturday morning. It played into three years of Kremlin propaganda casting Mr. Zelensky as a foolhardy ruler who would sooner or later exhaust the patience of his Western backers.

For the Kremlin, perhaps the most important message came in later remarks by Mr. Trump, who suggested that if Ukraine did not agree to a “cease-fire now,” the war-torn country would have to “fight it out” without American help.

Tom Nichols:

The sheer rudeness shown to a foreign guest and friend of the United States was (to use a word) deplorable as a matter of manners and grace, but worse, Trump and Vance acted like a couple of online Kremlin sock puppets instead of American leaders. They pushed talking points that they either knew or should have known were wrong. Even if Zelensky were as fluent and capable in English as Winston Churchill, he would never have been able to rebut the flood of falsehoods. No, the U.S. has not given Ukraine $350 billion; yes, Zelensky has repeatedly expressed his thanks to America and to Trump; no, Zelensky was not attacking the administration. The Ukrainian leader did his best to stand up to the bullying, but Trump and Vance were playing to the cameras and the MAGA gallery at home.

David Frum:

We’re witnessing the self-sabotage of the United States. “America First” always meant America alone, a predatory America whose role in the world is no longer based on democratic belief. America voted at the United Nations earlier this week against Ukraine, siding with Russia and China against almost all of its fellow democracies. Is this who Americans want to be? For this is what America is being turned into.

 

 

tiseme

Infamy: Voting with Russia Against Ukraine

Our forthcoming book is The Comeback: The 2024 Elections and American Politics. The second Trump administration is off to an ominous start.

Jennifer Hansler, CNN:

The United States joined Russia to vote against a UN General Assembly resolution condemning Russia’s war against Ukraine Monday in a stunning shift from years of US policy.

The vote against the Ukrainian and European-backed resolution saw the US at odds with its longtime European allies and instead aligned with the aggressor in the war on the three-year anniversary of Moscow’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine.

The US again voted the same way as Russia later Monday on a US-proposed UN Security Council resolution that did not call the Kremlin the aggressor or acknowledge Ukraine’s territorial integrity. The resolution passed without the support of five European members of the Security Council.

The US’ shocking alignment with Russia at the United Nations came as the Trump administration has pursued discussions with Moscow about ending the war. President Donald Trump has ratcheted up his rhetoric towards Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky. European partners have rushed to adjust to the shift in US policy and French President Emmanuel Macron met with Trump at the White House Monday.

WSJ:

The resolution has no practical importance, though it does underscore Mr. Trump’s turn toward Russia in the conflict. Perhaps he thinks that telling the truth about Russia will cause Mr. Putin to walk away from the Ukraine negotiations. Ronald Reagan, who also sought peace and achieved it, never shrank from telling the truth about the Soviet Union. The truth was an essential weapon in defeating what Reagan called an “evil empire.”

Meanwhile, at the White House on Monday, Mr. Trump and Emmanuel Macron discussed the Ukraine talks. The French President went out of his way to praise Mr. Trump’s peace effort and said Europe will be willing to deploy peace-keeping troops to Ukraine after a deal is struck. Mr. Macron also made clear such a deal would have to be backed by U.S. guarantees to be credible. He’s certainly right given that a cease-fire would give Russia a chance to rearm for another invasion if the U.S. abandons Europe.

Mr. Trump didn’t say if the U.S. would provide such guarantees. It’s hard to be optimistic if he won’t tell the truth about which country started the war.