On Friday in the Oval Office, President Donald Trump told Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky: “You are not in a very good position.”
It was a part of a tirade in which both Trump and Vice President JD Vance — on camera — tore into the leader of a country that has been fighting for three years for its survival after being invaded by its much larger neighbor, Russia. Veteran political observers could not remember a similar time in which a U.S. president and vice president vociferously lit into the leader of a nation that had been an ally.
But by his words and actions, Trump risks not just Ukraine’s future — he risks ensuring it will be the United States that won’t be in a very good position in the future. Trump and Vance willingly risk the long-term safety of our nation and freedom in the world. It was a day of shame for the nation’s foreign policy.
Every country needs allies, based on trust built up over decades. If Trump walks away from our commitments to Ukraine and perhaps NATO, that trust can’t be regained easily, with some kind of future walk-back memo. Trump is severing a source of America’s strength.
This is a critical moment when members of Congress, including many Republicans, need to stand up and vociferously defend America’s values. Unfortunately, as of Friday afternoon, only Republicans Rep. Don Bacon of Colorado, a former Air Force general; Brian Fitzgerald of Pennsylvania; and Mike Lawler of New York had spoken up.
Are the others walking away from values their party has stood for over decades?
To his credit, Zelensky kept his poise during the interaction, though Trump and Vance repeatedly interrupted him when he tried to speak. We can only imagine how Ukrainians, including the thousands who now call Chicago home after fleeing the war’s destruction, are feeling now. What happened Friday must be especially tough for them to watch after the gut-punch of Trump recently siding with Russia to vote against a United Nations resolution condemning Russia for the war.
For the world’s authoritarians, especially Russian President Vladimir Putin, it can easily be seen as a day of triumph.
Americans support Ukraine
Alexander Kuzma, chief development officer for the Ukrainian Catholic University Foundation in Chicago, told us he was initially encouraged when Trump told Putin he needed to end the war. In recent weeks, though, he’s been disheartened.
“On the one hand, he talks to Putin, who has destroyed over 600 churches, massacred people in Bucha, Irpin, Izyum and other towns, committed multiple war crimes [and] Trump calls him and it’s all peaches and cream,” Kuzma told us. “Then the guy trying to keep his country together, who’s done his best to support Western democracy, is subjected to an old-fashioned whipping.”
Zelensky, Kuzma noted, has expressed gratitude to the American people multiple times for their support. Calling him ungrateful, as Trump and Vance did, is “a complete misrepresentation of the facts.”
Americans are more likely to support aid to Ukraine than oppose it: A February Pew Research Center survey found that 46% of people said the level of aid America provides is either “not enough” or “about right”; 24% said they weren’t sure. Only 30% said America provides too much aid. The partisan difference, however, was stark: 62% of Democrats say the U.S. is providing enough aid or should do more, compared to just 30% of Republicans in those categories.
Trump and Vance say what’s needed is negotiation to end the war. But Friday wasn’t a negotiation. It was an attempt to dress down an ally fighting for its freedom, in order to curry favor with the aggressor. Europe is right to band together, out of fear that if Putin should conquer Ukraine, he will turn his eyes toward member states of NATO.
As U.S. Rep. Mike Quigley, D-Ill., a member of the House Intelligence Committee told us, Trump is fundamentally turning his back on all the reasons that America fought World War II and worked to rebuild and stabilize the world afterward.
Instead, Trump has made it more clear than perhaps ever before that he is aligned with Putin. A day before the meeting with Zelensky, Trump said he believed he could trust Putin because the two of them, together, went through the investigation of Russian influence in the 2016 presidential election.
Ukraine has shown it can flexible, even agreeing to talk about a deal to give the United States access to its rare minerals. Instead, Trump seems intent on giving Putin an undisputed win.
Trump may think he looked tough on Friday. Instead, he came across as a weak bully. That certainly won’t help Ukraine — and it’s not a good sign for America.
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