The Most Influential Person in Washington...
...is whoever Trump talked to last.
Yesterday, President Trump posted something on Truth Social that genuinely caught me off guard:
After getting to know and fully understand the Ukraine/Russia Military and Economic situation and, after seeing the Economic trouble it is causing Russia, I think Ukraine, with the support of the European Union, is in a position to fight and WIN all of Ukraine back in its original form. With time, patience, and the financial support of Europe and, in particular, NATO, the original Borders from where this War started, is very much an option. Why not? Russia has been fighting aimlessly for three and a half years a War that should have taken a Real Military Power less than a week to win. This is not distinguishing Russia. In fact, it is very much making them look like “a paper tiger.” When the people living in Moscow, and all of the Great Cities, Towns, and Districts all throughout Russia, find out what is really going on with this War, the fact that it’s almost impossible for them to get Gasoline through the long lines that are being formed, and all of the other things that are taking place in their War Economy, where most of their money is being spent on fighting Ukraine, which has Great Spirit, and only getting better, Ukraine would be able to take back their Country in its original form and, who knows, maybe even go further than that! Putin and Russia are in BIG Economic trouble, and this is the time for Ukraine to act. In any event, I wish both Countries well. We will continue to supply weapons to NATO for NATO to do what they want with them. Good luck to all!
DONALD J. TRUMP, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA
This was a surprise for several reasons:
1) Trump generally fashions himself an expert on most things, and famously promised to end the Russia/Ukraine war on his first day in office. It is unusual to hear him admit that, only now, he has gotten to know and “fully understand” the situation.
2) Back in February, with the whole world watching, he told Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelensky that Ukraine didn’t “have the cards.” Now, he apparently believes that it’s Russia that’s at a disadvantage, and Ukraine has the upper hand in the conflict.
3) Trump had previously held the position that the war needed to end immediately through diplomatic means, and that that would involve Ukraine giving up land to Russia. Now, he appears to think the war should continue, and that Ukraine doesn’t need to give up any of its territory — in fact, that they could “maybe even go further than that!”
4) Trump entered office highly skeptical of giving Ukraine the weapons necessary to continue fighting. Now, he says the U.S. “will continue to supply weapons to NATO for NATO to do what they want with them.”
So, that’s at least four major reversals in a single paragraph. I’ll admit I wasn’t quite as dialed into the news as I usually am, while home for a holiday. So when I got the Truth Social notification on my phone and read that post, I really had no explanation for it. It seemed like an enormous change in rhetoric, completely out of nowhere.
Then I started checking in on the day’s news, and realized the change was much more explicable than it had seemed. Unbeknownst to me, while in New York, Trump had spent the morning meeting with Zelensky.
Suddenly, everything snapped into place. In fact, I wrote about this exact dynamic just last month, referring to this same issue:
At several stages, Trump has come close to using a Rooseveltian “big stick” against both Russia and Ukraine, in order to get each side in line — threatening to pull intelligence support for Ukraine, and to impose sanctions against Russia. So far, at least, he’s been pulled back from the brink each time, seeming to take the side of whichever leader he speaks to last.
We had merely arrived at the next stage of a cycle we have gone through multiple times in just eight months: Trump meeting with either Putin or Zelensky, and immediately taking their side in the war between their two countries. (The lone exception to this pattern, as I noted, was the disastrous Trump-Zelensky meeting in February.)
This certainly seems like a more full-throated support of Ukraine than Trump has offered in his second term — so perhaps it will stick unlike the other statements — but as for understanding how it happened, it wasn’t hard to deduce. Trump sat down with Zelensky, and over the course of an hour, was apparently persuaded to drop almost everything he had long believed about the conflict: that Russia was the dominant power (not a “paper tiger”), that Ukraine was losing, that Ukraine should maintain its borders, that the U.S. shouldn’t remain involved.
This wasn’t even the only example of this in the last 24 hours.
Yesterday’s newsletter was rendered almost immediately out of date (an occupational hazard of covering the Trump era), since I had reported that Trump would be meeting with Democratic congressional leaders Chuck Schumer and Hakeem Jeffries this week about a potential funding deal, only for Trump to cancel the meeting shortly thereafter.
Here’s that Truth Social post:
After reviewing the details of the unserious and ridiculous demands being made by the Minority Radical Left Democrats in return for their Votes to keep our thriving Country open, I have decided that no meeting with their Congressional Leaders could possibly be productive. They are threatening to shut down the Government of the United States unless they can have over $1 Trillion Dollars in new spending to continue free healthcare for Illegal Aliens (A monumental cost!), force Taxpayers to fund Transgender surgery for minors, have dead people on the Medicaid roles, allow Illegal Alien Criminals to steal Billions of Dollars in American Taxpayer Benefits, try to force our Country to again open our Borders to Criminals and to the World, allow men to play in women’s sports, and essentially create Transgender operations for everybody. These Radical Left Views and Policies is what allowed me to win the Presidential Election, including all seven Swing States, and the Popular Vote, IN A HISTORIC LANDSLIDE. There are consequences to losing Elections but, based on their letter to me, the Democrats haven’t figured that out yet. They are trying to eliminate the popular $50 Billion Dollar Rural and Vulnerable Hospital Fund, which was passed with only Republican Votes, and proudly signed into Law by ME. The Democrats in Congress seem to have totally lost their way. They obviously have no idea what it means to put America First or to MAKE AMERICA GREAT AGAIN! All Congressional Democrats want to do is enact Radical Left Policies that nobody voted for — High Taxes, Open Borders, No Consequences for Violent Criminals, Men in Women’s Sports, Taxpayer funded “TRANSGENDER” surgery, and much more. Few people voted for what they represent, which would lead to the destruction of America. Instead, people voted for COMMON SENSE, and that’s what the Republicans and your President, “DONALD J. TRUMP,” stand for. I look forward to meeting with them if they get serious about the future of our Nation. We must keep the Government open, and legislate like true Patriots rather than hold American Citizens hostage, knowing that they want our now thriving Country closed. I’ll be happy to meet with them if they agree to the Principles in this Letter. They must do their job! Otherwise, it will just be another long and brutal slog through their radicalized quicksand. To the Leaders of the Democrat Party, the ball is in your court. I look forward to meeting with you when you become realistic about the things that our Country stands for. DO THE RIGHT THING!
(Quick fact check:
It’s true that the Democratic government funding proposal would cost more than $1 trillion — highly unusual for a one-month funding patch — since it would permanently extend the enhanced Obamacare premium subsidies and reverse Medicaid cuts from the One Big Beautiful Bill Act (OBBBA).
It is not true that the proposal would offer “free healthcare for Illegal Aliens,” since Medicaid already was not available to immigrants here illegally even before the OBBBA.
It’s true that the proposal would repeal provisions from the OBBBA to comb the Medicaid rolls for dead people. (A 2023 audit by the HHS found that, in the 14 states that were examined, $249 million in Medicaid payments fraudulently went to enrollees who had died.)
It’s true that the proposal would eliminate the rural hospital fund in the OBBBA — although it will also eliminate the new Medicaid work requirements, which is what the rural hospital fund was created to offset in the first place.
It is not true that the Democratic proposal has anything to do with open borders, or funding “Transgender surgery for minors,” allowing “men to play in women’s sports,” or creating “Transgender operations for everybody.”)
But, anyway, back to the cancellation of the meeting.
As I wrote yesterday, the idea of a Trump-Schumer-Jeffries meeting was something of a risk for House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-LA) and Senate Majority Leader John Thune (R-SD).
I think if the meeting had taken place, we probably would have ended up in the same place: without an agreement to avert a shutdown. But there was always the possibility, especially if Johnson and Thune weren’t in the room, that Trump might have leaned into his dealmaking side, and decided to ink a bipartisan compromise, particularly if Schumer and Jeffries emphasized to him that it was in his political interest to extend the Obamacare subsidies.
This happened several times in his first term, with Trump striking bipartisan deals on government funding, immigration, and gun control by going around the Republican leaders and negotiating with Schumer and Nancy Pelosi. Only the funding deal ended up becoming law, because GOP leaders intervened to persuade Trump out of things he had just agreed to.
This time, Johnson and Thune clearly decided to cut off any potential bipartisan deal at the pass.
According to Punchbowl News, the two GOP leaders spoke on the phone with Trump on Monday night and persuaded him not to sit down with Schumer and Jeffries. In a short period, Trump went from saying that he’d “love” to meet with the Democrats (while also expressing skepticism that it would produce anything) to calling off the confab, seemingly, because Johnson and Thune told him to.
(As a sidenote: Now that the meeting is off, the odds of a shutdown are incredibly high. With six days to go until the deadline, it’s hard to see Democrats climbing down from their demands — and, to be clear, they do have a lot of them, even if they aren’t what Trump characterized — without some sort of sit-down with Trump or the Republican leaders. Schumer and Thune apparently aren’t talking either, which doesn’t help.)
But back to Trump.
The president’s malleability is nothing new: it’s been well-established, in this newsletter and elsewhere, over several years that he has a highly flexible ideology, susceptible to being molded by whoever was in his ear last.
But these are two fairly remarkable examples, both in the space of a day, of Trump seeming to change his stance on two big issues — a three-year-long war and what he might do to avert a government shutdown — purely because his most recent conversation partners bent his ear.
Just don’t get used to either of these positions! Wait a few weeks and see if the winds shift: as always in Trumpworld, everything is subject to change.
I'm not sure it was Trump who wrote that post. There are NO CAPITAL LETTERS, and the wording actually makes sense.
I believe Trump has FTD….Frontotemporal Dementia