Zelenskyy came to the United States to sign the minerals deal. He even demanded that the signing occur in the United States and in front of the world. The deal could have been signed anywhere, but the Z-man wanted to sit down with Donald Trump.
Most people have conveniently forgotten that it was Zelenskyy himself who first proposed a deal like this to tie the US to Ukraine by something other than payoffs to Hunter Biden, and it was actually a pretty smart move. It went straight to Donald Trump's desire to do deals, and while Zelenskyy probably hated the hard bargain Trump has driven, he knew that it was the best deal he was going to get.
But something happened on the way to the Oval Office, and now we know what it was.
— carl1961 🇺🇸🇺🇸🇺🇸 (@cmshelton2021) March 2, 2025
The warmongers among the Democrat Party intervened and convinced Zelenskyy to renege on the deal and try to humiliate Trump. They appeared to think that an ambush of Trump in the Oval would either force him to concede more to Ukraine than he was otherwise willing, or at least humiliate Trump and give them political ammunition they could use to weaken Trump as he romps over them.
If you doubt that Zelenskyy went into the meeting planning to antagonize Trump, Steve Hayward over at PowerLine shares a tidbit from a Polish diplomat.
But my Poland-based friend Clifford Angell Bates passes along this Tweet from Michał Kuź, a Polish diplomat who earned a Ph.D in political science in the U.S. (Keep in mind that Poland is extremely anti-Russian and pro-Ukraine in this war.)
I listened very carefully to the entire (approx. 50 min.) public part of the exchange between Volodymyr Zelensky and Donald Trump and JD Vance. Sorry, I’ll be honest, Zelensky absolutely did not let himself be provoked, he was actively looking for a fight, or he knows nothing at all about American political culture. Trump, yes, nonchalantly approached the facts about European politics and history, like most Americans. However, he was relatively conciliatory for 80% of the time of the conversation, talking about himself as a businessman who had “reached an agreement” and wanted to take a middle position between the parties to the conflict. Zelensky kept correcting him, attacking him; he even countered neutral remarks about the destruction of Ukrainian cities, which could have been safely passed over in silence. Vance also initially attacked his predecessors, not Zelensky. It was Zelensky who first attacked Vance, as if he owed him something. Then everything spilled over.
No, seriously, just compare it to how Macron, for example, spoke to Trump. I understand where the hearts of Polish commentators lie. Americans are, however, extremely sensitive to a certain political decorum during such meetings, even more so than the British, only this decorum is slightly different, less rigid in language, but very, very clearly emphasizing the status of the Republic. I lived and worked in the US for years and culturally, humanly, I literally have no words for what the president of Ukraine did, my teeth hurt from gnashing when I watched it in its entirety. As I wrote, I perceive Zelensky’s behavior as an attempt to play to the public in Kiev, then he will return to negotiations. However, if there is no such return, it will be his own fault.
I don't know what they expected, but it sure didn't work out well for Volodymyr Zelenskyy.
A common criticism of Volodymyr Zelensky’s disastrous Friday performance in the Oval Office is that he failed to read the room.
Actually, the Ukrainian president did read a room — but it was the wrong room.
Before meeting Trump, Zelensky met with anti-Trump Democrats who advised him to reject the terms of the mineral deal the president was offering, according to Sen. Chris Murphy (D-Conn.).
“Just finished a meeting with President Zelensky here in Washington. He confirmed that the Ukrainian people will not support a fake peace agreement where Putin gets everything he wants and there are no security arrangements for Ukraine,” Murphy’s office posted on X at 11:15 a.m. Friday.
He attached a picture of Zelensky at a conference table, with Murphy seated on the opposite side.
I knew about the meeting but hadn't seen Murphy's tweet, and assumed that it was a photo opportunity to make the attendants look good. Apparently not.
In a perverse way, Murphy and other Dems got the outcome they wanted. The fireworks at the White House gave them an excuse to replay their Russia Russia Russia hoax.
Once again, they and their media handmaidens are dishonestly insisting that Trump is in Vladimir Putin’s camp.
Like the original Russia hoax that consumed much of Trump’s first term, Russia 2.0 is born of political desperation. After months of not knowing how to respond to Trump’s fast, populist start to his second term, Dems up and down the food chain decided that the president’s refusal to write a blank check to Zelensky and pledge a military guarantee amounts to a gift to Putin.
Desperate for relevance
The logic is twisted beyond description, but any port in a storm will do. And with Trump off to the fastest start of any president in modern history, Dems are desperate to be relevant.
It’s a mark of their bad judgment that Zelensky is their new hero. He and they have zero chance of persuading tapped-out Americans that an open-ended commitment of their tax dollars and possibly sending troops to Ukraine is sensible.
Certainly Trump supporters didn’t vote for that, and the president himself campaigned on bringing the war to a fast end, not sending our army to fight Russians.
Zelenskyy's petulance in the Oval has cost him dearly, losing even Lindsey Graham, who is perhaps his biggest fanboy.
Today, President Trump gave a masterclass on how to stand up for America. pic.twitter.com/hekqo9j9TM
— Lindsey Graham (@LindseyGrahamSC) February 28, 2025
To the hand-wringing Europeans who felt offended by President Trump rejecting being lectured by President Zelensky: Be my guest to defend Ukraine from Putin. It is long past time for the Europeans to show they are capable of defending their own continent. They’ve allowed their militaries to be hollowed out and when Europe speaks, no bad guy listens. I say this with great sadness: The last group of people that I would count on to defend freedom are the Europeans.
It's hard to say whether the Democrats' move was purely cynical on the Democrats' part, sacrificing Zelenskyy and Ukraine to their own political ambitions, or whether they thought both they and Z would equally benefit.
To the hand-wringing Europeans who felt offended by President Trump rejecting being lectured by President Zelensky: Be my guest to defend Ukraine from Putin.
— Lindsey Graham (@LindseyGrahamSC) March 1, 2025
It is long past time for the Europeans to show they are capable of defending their own continent.
They’ve allowed…
In either case, the ploy failed utterly. Sure, Trump is taking flak, but Zelenskyy will be forced to crawl back to Trump, and Trump will accept Z's apology and humiliate him while doing so. Zelenskyy will have to bend the knee, Trump will get a big win, and the Democrats will ultimately lose this issue, and likely quite soon because the Europeans desperately want this deal to happen lest they lose all American support for Ukraine and NATO.
🔥 @marcorubio: "The sooner everyone grows up around here and figures out that this is a bad war that's heading in a bad direction... the more progress we're going to be able to make. But @POTUS is crystal clear... he is going to be a president that tries to achieve peace." pic.twitter.com/zAeO9gcuXe
— Trump War Room (@TrumpWarRoom) March 2, 2025
US NATO membership is quite literally on the line, and with it Europe's entire defensive power. Europe will fall in line because it must.
Elon Musk appears to back US withdrawing from NATO and the UN https://t.co/vQ8jVkUnGA pic.twitter.com/1WdBIABkQO
— New York Post (@nypost) March 2, 2025
Europeans may talk tough about going it alone, but they simply do not have the capacity--currently--to do so. They could build up over a decade or two, but right now they need the US as a guarantor of international security. Trump knows that, as do they. This is why cooler heads in Europe are backtracking and telling Zelenskyy to sit down, shut up, and sign the deal.
That cute little stunt Kier Starmer did is already being walked back as it didn’t work and only embarrassed everyone except the USA, which now looks stronger than ever. https://t.co/uywP7GAxX0
— Cernovich (@Cernovich) March 2, 2025
Europe certainly could defend itself should they choose to do so. They have 3x the population and 10x the economic output of Russia. But they have chosen to hide behind the skirts of America while screaming obscenities and insulting us. Trump will not tolerate that.
Zelenskyy took advice from the wrong people and, once he FA, he FO.
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