Trump Cannot Bully Zelenskyy
On Friday, February 28, Donald Trump attacked one of the most valiant freedom fighters on the planet. Volodymyr Zelenskyy was invited into the Oval Office to complete a deal exchanging protection from the United States for Ukrainian mineral rights worth a half trillion American dollars.
On Monday, March 3, Trump’s talking points include that President Zelenskyy should apologize or that he should resign. Trump has also rather ominously indicated that Zelenskyy might be forced to resign if he is not wiling to make a deal with Russia. He has posted on his social media that the end of war for Ukraine is “very, very far away.”
You Know How Trump Does
Apparently, Trump thinks he can treat countries in Europe the same way he treats Republicans of the House and Senate. Whenever Trump doesn’t like a legislator, he utters ominously or criticizes them on his social media site. Generally, the legislator in question either gets in line or simply resigns. If not, someone pays someone else to challenge that person in the next election. A few legislators have admitted that they or their families were threatened. Many simply remain quiet.
Recently Trump has begun extending this harassment beyond Congress. When he was on trial under Judge Merchan, he published the name and address of the judge’s clerk on his social media site. Eventually harassment extended to the judge’s daughter. Trump’s spineless Republicans lined up outside of the courthouse in challenge of the judge’s gag order. He has threatened several governors that he will withhold from them the taxes we’ve paid. Now it seems he is threatening leaders of sovereign nations.
Tell Trump What Time It Is
Americans must stand up and let Trump know that we are sick of his bullying. It was bad enough when he called his political rivals by nicknames and even insulted their spouses. Americans are not afraid of others, but we do not seek to bully others. Trump exposes his own insecurities by bullying others to get what he wants, and he has encouraged his followers to copy that advice.
Rather than expect an apology from Ukraine’s brave president, perhaps it’s time for Trump to apologize for the request he made of Zelenskyy in 2019 to say he had dirt on Joe Biden or his son Hunter. Mind you, Trump didn’t care whether Zelenskyy really had dirt on them; he just wanted him to hint of it, and he said he and his Rs (Republicans?) would handle the rest.
It’s time to stop Trump from his continued lying and bullying.
Trump Lies About the Money
Here’s up-to-date information on the amount of aid we’ve provided to Ukraine. Trump has lied and repeatedly claimed the amount is $350 billion. According to the Kiel Tracker (using a methodology dating from 2023), as of the end of 2024 we provided aid in the amount of $119,024,936,845. Wikipedia shows that $39,112,000,000 was in cash, with Ukraine expected to repay $21 billion. The remaining $79.9 billion was in the provision of our outdated military supplies. The government then ordered updated replacements to be created in our own factories, paying our own workers good salaries and benefits.
The total dollar amount we gave to Ukraine puts us at the top of the list. However, if you consider our donation by percentage of GDP, then eleven other nations provided more to Ukraine than we did. That means European countries with weaker economies gave a greater percentage than we did.
Ukraine’s Expectations
The next thing to consider is why Zelenskyy was there and what he expected to receive. He was willing to sign away rights to valuable, rare minerals located in Ukraine in exchange for assurances that Russia will never invade Ukraine again. Trump’s response seemed to be, “Oh, they won’t bother you anymore.”
Well, in exchange for a half trillion dollars’ worth of mineral rights, Zelenskyy wanted it spelled out. After all, the United States and the United Kingdom both signed the Budapest Memorandum with Ukraine and Russia in 1994 guaranteeing no more aggression against Ukraine. In exchange for this Ukraine gave up nuclear weapons that were located there from its days as part of the USSR.
Trump and Vance Must Resign
Many people believe that Trump and Vance never planned to sign a contract with Zelenskyy. Our top leaders decided in advance to double-team Zelenskyy as he sat in the Oval Office, for two reasons. First, Trump still hates Zelenskyy because he refused to say he had dirt on Joe Biden back in 2019. Second, he wanted to serve up a video of Zelenskyy squirming to the man whom Trump most admires: Vladimir Putin. One or more journalists from the Russian news agency TASS somehow were in the room, livestreaming, even though they were not on the approved press list. Now we have given Putin film of our leaders mocking Zelenskyy.
Support of Ukraine is something that we undertook united as a nation. If Putin wins in Ukraine, he will march through to Poland or Romania and begin an assault there. He will not stop until he rebuilds the former USSR. If Putin wins in Ukraine, other dictators such as Xi in China and Kim Jong Un of North Korea will see that the world has become a place where one country can simply take what it wants from another, and that cannot happen.
This also puts the other democracies in Europe at risk—including England and other parts of the British realm. Trump has repeatedly complained about NATO, and our allies must believe that we wish to leave, but it is another thing to stand alone in the world because we are an untrusted pariah.
One can only conclude that an insecure bully of a leader who would put his country into such a position either possesses inadequate skills for the job or suffers from a mental disorder such that he cannot recognize his own lies and mistakes. In either case, we must ask Trump to resign. His partners, Elon Musk and J.D. Vance, must likewise vacate their positions. The American people will never accept Trump’s attempted alignment with Putin.