Tommy and Ben discuss Donald Trump and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky’s disastrous meeting at the White House that erupted in a yelling match and resulted in Zelensky being told to leave. They dig into JD Vance’s role as instigator, the revealed motivations for attacking Zelensky in front of the press, and what Zelensky’s options are for pursuing peace from here.
Chapter 1: What sparked the conflict in the Trump-Zelensky meeting?
And we are doing a little YouTube exclusive episode today based off of President Zelensky's meeting with Donald Trump just now. We were going to plan to do this regardless. But Ben, I didn't expect it to be. The worst meeting ever in the Oval Office? I'm trying to think of an example of a meeting that went worse.
I mean, there was the infamous Bibi Netanyahu-Obama meeting that you and I were both in the room for, but it was nothing even close to what just happened.
Not even close, yeah. This is unlike anything that has taken place in my entire lifetime. And, you know... I'd have to mine my brain. I mean, I assume there were some tough meetings, you know, in the Civil War. But yeah, never, never. We've never seen anything like it. Yeah.
OK, well, we'll cut to the chase and start to play you some of that. We have a very long clip and we're going to play some excerpts, pause and talk about them and play some more, because honestly, it was just impossible to cut it down. It was that. Much of a fucking train wreck. So with that, here is a clip from Zelensky and Trump's meeting in the Oval Office today, Friday, February 28th.
He broke in this 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, J.D., you are speaking about?
What do you mean? I'm talking about the kind of diplomacy that's going to end the destruction of your country. Mr. President, with respect, I think it's disrespectful for you to come into the Oval Office and try to litigate this in front of the American media. Right now, you guys are going around and forcing conscripts to the front lines because you have manpower problems.
You should be thanking the President for trying to bring it into this conflict.
Have you ever been to Ukraine that you say what problems we have?
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Chapter 2: How did JD Vance influence the Trump-Zelensky meeting?
I have been to come one. I have actually I've actually watched and seen the stories. And I know what happens is you bring people, you bring them on a propaganda tour, Mr. President.
OK, stop.
Yeah. OK, stop. This is the worst OK, stop episode in history. So what you can hear there is Zelensky does this wind up where he's talking about how we can't trust Putin to implement a ceasefire because he breaks every agreement he's ever signed.
And actually, I was just watching Mike Pompeo on Fox News talking about how the United States pulled out of all these arms control agreements during the first Trump administration because Trump because Putin was breaking the terms of the deal. But, you know, it was hard to tell exactly what kind of sets the meeting off here, Ben. But I do think J.D.
Vance is kind of the chief arsonist because Zelensky pretty quickly calls him out and is like, OK, you seem to know a lot about my country. Have you ever been there? And obviously, obviously, J.D. Vance has not. And he flips out about it and just, I guess, says that any visit to Ukraine is a propaganda tour now.
Yeah, two things stand out to me about this. First, just so people know what Zelensky is talking about, he's talking about the Minsk agreement that was reached in the late Obama administration to essentially freeze the conflict and have some kind of process whereby the Ukrainians had autonomous regions in these places where the Russians had invaded in eastern Ukraine. And what he's saying is,
Putin broke the ceasefire. The last time someone tried to do what Trump's doing, you know, Putin is the one that violated the agreement and reinvaded the country and dramatically escalated. And that's just a fact. It's not an opinion. You know, so this is going to be a reoccurring theme here that Zelensky is saying facts and J.D.
Vance and Trump are just basically offering Kremlin talking points in response. And then, Tommy, I said this to you, but for J.D.
Vance to refer to visits that people make to Ukraine as propaganda tours was one of the most triggering things and many that were said today, because what people do when they go to Ukraine is they they often visit Bucha, for instance, where there were war crimes committed, where innocent civilians were massacred, where children were killed. And to call that a propaganda tour is so beyond the pale.
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Chapter 3: Why is Zelensky's position on the Ukraine conflict significant?
But Ben, I'm glad you mentioned Zelensky. uh, Bucha because, you know, that's another triggering thing for me because you often hear these same conservatives, actually Democrats to talk about how there were some early peace talks between the Ukrainians and the Russians, but they blew up and they often blame Zelensky for pulling out of those talks.
In fact, those talks blew up because the atrocities that occurred at Bucha were revealed and it became impossible for anyone in Ukraine to imagine cutting a deal with Putin and the Russians in that moment.
Yeah, and this context was entirely missing. They seemed to be offended by Zelensky pointing out that his country was invaded by Putin. That seemed to offend Trump and J.D. Vance. And I think another piece of context here, Tommy, is – Zelensky is a profoundly exhausted person. And you can see it on his face. You can see it on his face. I've heard this from some Europeans.
This guy probably barely sleeps at night. He has been besieged by the Trump administration, bullied into trying to sign this absurd deal for – critical minerals. And he flies to Washington because he feels this thing slipping away from him, this thing being U.S. support as kind of a Hail Mary.
And then he sits down and they bring the cameras in and he just starts getting insulted to his face by people who can demonstrate no degree of empathy. I mean, like they don't even, not even a perfunctory, you know, tribute to what the people of Ukraine have done. And they insulted not just Zelensky, this is important, They insulted the Ukrainian people.
He said the only people you can get to fight are conscripts that you force to the front line. So that's insulting the troops. That's insulting the Ukrainians that have been fighting and saying they don't want to be there. They're only there because Zelensky made them go there. When in fact, Putin is the one that conscripts people. Putin is the one that did the mobilization.
And so we can talk later about whether Zelensky erred tactically here, but I have a great deal of empathy for what he had to go through.
Yeah, I mean, look, Trump being offended by reality and people insulting Zelensky is going to be a theme of this thing. The press corps even gets in on the action, but we'll get to that in a minute. But let's keep rolling that clip.
Do you disagree that you've had problems bringing people into your military? And do you think that it's respectful to come to the Oval Office of the United States of America and attack the administration that is trying to prevent the destruction of your country?
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Chapter 4: How did Trump and his team react to Zelensky's statements?
Yeah, there's a lot in that one, too, Tommy. I mean, first of all, boy, to say that Zelensky is the one that's gambling with World War Three when Putin is the one that invaded the country. I mean, the Ukrainians didn't want they don't want to be in this war.
And Trump is pulling out support for NATO, which has prevented World War Three.
Yeah. Yeah. Like what's so fucking bonkers about this is like the the. all the things that Trump and Van Say presuppose that Zelensky somehow wants this war and wanted this war when he was just invaded by Russia. They're the ones that raised the risks of World War III. Then to hear them lecture him about needing to thank Mr. Trump, you know,
first of all, Zelensky always thanks the United States repeatedly. He's done it, by the way, since Trump has been president, expressed gratitude for the support the United States supplies. Even though, by the way, Donald Trump is not the one that provided that support. It was Joe Biden and the United States Congress on a bipartisan basis.
But they want Zelensky to behave like a Trump staffer there. Thank you, Mr. Trump, for being such a great president. And they don't do this
to other leaders you know they don't hector other leaders like this in the oval office they you know they they they they're picking on him they're like schoolyard bullies picking on a small injured person to impress their friends and it's like three on one you can hear all of them like chiding him be like yes you were mean yes you did say that it literally sounds like a schoolyard taunting and he didn't insult when did he insult did you do you know what they're referring because he shouldn't insult the u.s he just explained facts facts are insulting to true
Trump is mad. It's earlier on in this Oval Office meeting because this was a very, very long pool spray. And just to give folks a little context, what usually happens is the two leaders go into the Oval Office. They sit down. You bring the pool, the White House press pool in for like a minute or two. Sometimes there's a shadow question.
They take photos and then they get them the hell out of there. They have the real meeting. There was supposed to be a lunch and then there's supposed to be a press conference.
trump has started doing this thing where he takes like 45 minutes worth of questions during the pool spray and then they do the press conference just because he needs to be on tv all the time so what you didn't hear that happened earlier was you know trump's entire shtick about ukraine is the war never would have happened if he was president
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Chapter 5: What are the implications of Trump's approach to Ukraine?
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