Michael McFaul on Trump-Putin Meeting: ‘The Memes About This Summit Are Vicious Towards the President’

RUSH TRANSCRIPT:
People. And I can’t think of a single thing that we got out of this meeting.
>> You know, and ambassador Richard Engel, NBC’s correspondent there in Ukraine, pointed out that hours after this summit and that that whatever it was wasn’t even a press conference. Air sirens went off right in kharkiv. And, you know, I’m wondering about you’re talking about how the framing was all basically dictated by president Putin. And I wonder if that is the reason why president Zelenskyy, in his statement that he put out this morning, I, I notice how he is basically restating in his statement Ukraine’s position.
>> Right.
>> Not just that the killing should stop, but he needs to guarantees. And he says, at the very beginning today, after my conversation with President Trump, we further coordinated our positions with European, with European leaders. In my conversation with President Trump, I said that sanctions must be strengthened if there’s no trilateral meeting or if Russia evades an honest end to the war and continues to go through, as folks can see on the screen there, what Ukraine wants, basically, if Putin is going to set the framing there in Alaska, Zelenskyy wants to make it clear to the president and the world, no, no, no, no, no. Here’s what our framing is. Here’s what the facts on the ground are.
>> That’s exactly right. And I think in a panic, he knew that he had to get into this framing game. He needed that meeting. I think it’s very smart, by the way, that he includes European leaders on these calls. Right. So it’s not just him versus Trump. It’s him, our allies and Trump. And I’m glad he’s going to be in Washington on Monday to get his shot at reframing. I’m I know from the reactions of Ukrainian colleagues over the last 24 hours, they’re all in shock. The memes about this summit are vicious towards the president. But Zelenskyy has no choice, he can’t just post memes and make fun of the president. He’s a desperate leader that needs the president still to be engaged.
>> Is there a danger that there will be another Oval Office smackdown on Monday? Yeah. For Zelenskyy.
>> Well.
>> I hope not. I hope.
>> The vice president’s not there. You know, he or that he can be a little more disciplined this time around. But no, that that contrast. Right. I mean, just think about the images of that visit versus the visit we just saw with this imperial dictator from Russia. I hope it