Olympics turn political as US athletes speak out against Trump; The Hill, February 16, 2026

DOMINICK MASTRANGELO , The Hill; Olympics turn political as US athletes speak out against Trump

 "A growing number of Olympic athletes competing for the U.S. in this month’s Winter Games are expressing discomfort with representing the country under President Trump’s administration, sparking intense pushback from the president’s supporters and Trump himself. 

Trump attacked U.S. athlete Hunter Hess directly after Hess said he was conflicted about competing for Team USA given the country’s political climate.

“It brings up mixed emotions to represent the U.S. right now. I think it’s a little hard,” Hess, a freestyle skier, told reporters during a recent press conference. “There’s obviously a lot going on that I’m not the biggest fan of, and I think a lot of people aren’t. Just because I’m wearing the flag doesn’t mean I represent everything that’s going on in the U.S.” 

The president in a Truth Social post hours later called Hess a “real loser” and said it is “very hard to root for someone like this” when watching the games. 

Hess’s comments came days after Amber Glenn, an American figure skater, decried the administration’s policies toward people in the LGBTQ community."  

The world heard JD Vance being booed at the Olympics. Except for viewers in the US; The Guardian, February 7, 2026

Bryan Armen Graham  , The Guardian; The world heard JD Vance being booed at the Olympics. Except for viewers in the US

"The modern Olympics sell themselves on a simple premise: the whole world, watching the same moment, at the same time. On Friday night in Milan, that illusion fractured in real time.

When Team USA entered the San Siro during the parade of nations, the speed skater Erin Jackson led the delegation into a wall of cheers. Moments later, when cameras cut to US vice-president JD Vance and second lady Usha Vance, large sections of the crowd responded with boos. Not subtle ones, but audible and sustained ones. Canadian viewers heard them. Journalists seated in the press tribunes in the upper deck, myself included, clearly heard them. But as I quickly realized from a groupchat with friends back home, American viewers watching NBC did not.

On its own, the situation might once have passed unnoticed. But the defining feature of the modern sports media landscape is that no single broadcaster controls the moment any more. CBC carried it. The BBC liveblogged it. Fans clipped it. Within minutes, multiple versions of the same happening were circulating online – some with boos, some without – turning what might once have been a routine production call into a case study in information asymmetry.

For its part, NBC has denied editing the crowd audio, although it is difficult to resolve why the boos so audible in the stadium and on other broadcasts were absent for US viewers. But in a broader sense, it is becoming harder, not easier, to curate reality when the rest of the world is holding up its own camera angles. And that raises an uncomfortable question as the United States moves toward hosting two of the largest sporting events on the planet: the 2026 men’s World Cup and the 2028 Los Angeles Olympics.

If a US administration figure is booed at the Olympics in Los Angeles, or a World Cup match in New Jersey or Dallas, will American domestic broadcasts simply mute or avoid mentioning the crowd audio? If so, what happens when the world feed, or a foreign broadcaster, shows something else entirely? What happens when 40,000 phones in the stadium upload their own version in real time?

The risk is not just that viewers will see through it. It is that attempts to manage the narrative will make American broadcasters look less credible, not more. Because the audience now assumes there is always another angle. Every time a broadcaster makes that trade – credibility for insulation – it is a trade audiences eventually notice."

NBC appears to cut crowd’s booing of JD Vance from Winter Olympics broadcast; The Guardian, February 6, 2026

Tom Lutz , The Guardian; NBC appears to cut crowd’s booing of JD Vance from Winter Olympics broadcast

[Kip Currier: NBC's decision to edit out booing of JD Vance during the Winter Olympics' Opening Ceremony is not surprising, given prior instances of U.S. media editing of similar occurrences, as noted in this Guardian article. But it is nevertheless troubling. NBC is distorting and altering what actually happened, without informing viewers and listeners of its editorial decision-making.

The Opening Ceremony isn't a fictional movie: it's an historical, newsworthy event. As such, alterations to the historical record should not have been made.

Additionally, if a news organization like NBC decides to make changes to news reporting, like removing or suppressing sound for non-technical reasons, it should be transparent about having done so and explain the reasons for such alterations. Trust in news organizations is vital. Actions like sanitization and alterations of news reporting diminish public trust in the accuracy and integrity of news sources and disseminators.

NBCU Academy's website provides information on ethics in journalism. Its first principle "Seek the truth and be truthful in your reporting." is relevant to the editorial decision to edit out the booing of JD Vance:

What are journalism ethics?

Ethics are the guiding values, standards and responsibilities of journalism. At NBCU News Group, the following principles act as the foundation of ethical journalism:

Seek the truth and be truthful in your reporting. Your reporting should be accurate and fair. Ensure that the facts you gathered are verified, sources are attributed and context is provided. Journalists should be bold in seeking and presenting truths to the public, serving as watchdogs over public officials and holding the powerful accountable.

https://nbcuacademy.com/journalism-ethics/

The Society of Professional Journalists (SPJ) also maintains a Code of Ethics. One of its four guiding principles addresses transparency and accountability:

BE ACCOUNTABLE AND TRANSPARENT

Ethical journalism means taking responsibility for one's work and explaining one’s decisions to the public.

Journalists should:

 

Explain ethical choices and processes to audiences. Encourage a civil dialogue with the public about journalistic practices, coverage and news content.

 

Respond quickly to questions about accuracy, clarity and fairness.

 

Acknowledge mistakes and correct them promptly and prominently.

 

Explain corrections and clarifications carefully and clearly.

 

Expose unethical conduct in journalism, including within their organizations.

 

Abide by the same high standards they expect of others.

https://www.spj.org/pdf/spj-code-of-ethics.pdf] 

[Excerpt]

"The US vice-president, JD Vance, was greeted by a chorus of boos when he appeared at the opening ceremony of the Winter Olympics in Milan on Friday, although American viewers watching NBC’s coverage would have been unaware of the reception.

As speedskater Erin Jackson led Team USA into the San Siro stadium she was greeted by cheers. But when the TV cameras cut to Vance and his wife, Usha, there were boos, jeers and a smattering of applause from the crowd. The reaction was shown on Canadian broadcaster CBC’s feed, with one commentator saying: “There is the vice-president JD Vance and his wife Usha – oops, those are not … uh … those are a lot of boos for him. Whistling, jeering, some applause.”

The Guardian’s Sean Ingle was also at the ceremony and noted the boos, as did USA Today’s Christine Brennan. However, on the NBC broadcast the boos were not heard or remarked upon when Vance appeared on screen, with the commentary team simply saying “JD Vance”. That didn’t stop footage of the boos being circulated and shared on social media in the US. The White House posted a clip of Vance applauding on NBC’s broadcast without any boos.

Friday was not the first time there have been moves to stop US viewers from witnessing dissent against the Trump administration. At September’s US Open, tournament organizers asked broadcasters not to show the crowd’s reaction to Donald Trump, who attended the men’s final. Part of the message read: “We ask all broadcasters to refrain from showing any disruptions or reactions in response to the president’s attendance in any capacity.”

Earlier on Friday in Milan, hundreds of people protested against the presence of US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agents at this year’s Olympics. The US state department has said that several federal agencies, including ICE, will be at the Games to help protect visiting Americans. The state department said the ICE unit in Italy is separate from those involved in the immigration crackdown in the United States."

Vance Gives Deranged Excuse for Agents Killing ICU Nurse; The Daily Beast, January 25, 2026

Erkki Forster , The Daily Beast; Vance Gives Deranged Excuse for Agents Killing ICU Nurse

"JD Vance has suggested that Minnesota officials invited the killing of ICU nurse Alex Pretti in an unhinged defense of the Trump administration’s deportation operation...

He claimed on X that local officials “created the chaos so they can have moments like yesterday, where someone tragically dies and politicians get to grandstand about the evils of enforcing the border.”...

The vice president, who frequently makes false claims—such as alleging that Haitian migrants in Ohio are eating dogs—added, “This is just a taste of what’s happening in Minneapolis because state and local officials refuse to cooperate with immigration enforcement.”"

Catholic Vice President Vance takes to social media to justify killing of Renee Good; National Catholic Reporter, January 8, 2026

JOHN GROSSO, National Catholic Reporter ; Catholic Vice President Vance takes to social media to justify killing of Renee Good

"Yesterday (Jan. 7), 37-year-old Renee Good was shot and killed in a residential  Minneapolis neighborhood by an Immigration and Customs Enforcement officer. Good was a mother of three and an U.S. citizen.

Today, JD Vance has taken to social media to justify the shooting and blame Good for her own death...

There is no evidence that Good was in any way involved in domestic terrorism. Video evidence seems to entirely contradict Trump's explanation of the situation. The ICE officer does not appear to have been injured and is seen casually walking away after the shooting.

There does appear to be emerging video evidence that Good was confused by the orders she was receiving from multiple officers and was attempting to remove herself from the situation. There does not appear to be any concrete evidence of agitation and the videos do not show Good attempting to run down anyone with her car.

The investigation is ongoing, but the entire situation is a powder keg: Social media is on fire as users viciously debate the justification of the killing and it seems protests are beginning in Minneapolis and beyond.

But in spite of the increasing uproar, Vice President JD Vance said he sees the situation as "simple."...

At the time of publication of this piece, at no point has Vance tweeted any remorse, prayers or condolences regarding Good and her loved ones. Instead, Vance continued his storm of social media posts the morning after the shooting — this time leaning into divisive, tribalistic language to demonize Democrats...

As a Catholic, Vance knows better than to peddle this brand of gaslighting and agitation. Vance knows that, by virtue of her humanity, Good was endowed with inherent dignity, made in the image and likeness of God. Vance knows that only God can take life. Vance knows that protesting, fleeing or even interfering in an ICE investigation (which there is no evidence that Good did) does not carry a death sentence. Vance knows that lying and killing are sins.

Vance knows. He doesn't care. Vance’s twisted and wrongheaded view of Christianity has been repudiated by two popes. His Catholicism seems to be little more than a political prop, a tool only for his career ambitions and desire for power.

The vice president's comments justifying the death of Renee Good are a moral stain on the collective witness of our Catholic faith. His repeated attempts to blame Good for her own death are fundamentally incompatible with the Gospel. Our only recourse is to pray for his conversion of heart."

Newsom Rips New Catholic Vance for Denying Food to Poor; The Daily Beast, November 9, 2025

Katie Francis , The Daily Beast; Newsom Rips New Catholic Vance for Denying Food to Poor

"Gavin Newsom called out Catholic convert JD Vance for failing to uphold one of the major tenets of his adopted faith.

The California governor asked how the vice president could “square the circle” of being Catholic while resisting all efforts to restore Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) benefits, reminding the Vance that feeding the poor is “fundamental to advancing God’s will.”

Speaking to Jake Tapper on State of the Union Sunday, lifelong Irish Catholic Newsom, 58, lectured on Vance, 41, on the foundational lessons of their shared faith, suggesting that the latter’s religion and actions didn’t quite add up.

“I mean, Old Testament, New Testament,” Newsom said. “What‘s the fundamental thing that connects every—I mean, from John to Matthew to Proverbs? It‘s this notion of hunger, feeding the poor, the sick, the tired, this... it‘s not an option, it‘s central to advancing God‘s will.”"

SNAP Benefits: Josh Shapiro’s Rebuke of JD Vance Goes Viral; Newsweek, November 8, 2025

Khaleda Rahman, Newsweek ; SNAP Benefits: Josh Shapiro’s Rebuke of JD Vance Goes Viral

"Pennsylvania Governor Josh Shapiro’s scathing rebuke of Vice President JD Vance has gone viral on social media.

At a press conference on Friday, Shapiro was asked about Vance, who had called a court order that directed the Trump administration to fully fund the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) for November "absurd."

Shapiro, a Democrat, called Vance a “total phony” who “doesn’t give a damn about all Americans” and had turned his back on the Appalachian communities he once said he represented.

A clip of Shapiro’s comments garnered more than a million views after it was posted on X by the senior digital editor of the liberal Meidas Touch website...

Vance “rose to some prominence by writing a book about growing up in Appalachia, where there’s a whole lot of people who get SNAP," Shapiro said, referring to Vance's 2016 memoir, Hillbilly Elegy.

"He made millions of dollars on the backs of telling their stories, and then he turned his damn back on those very people who he likes to write about and claim as his own.”

Shapiro also said Vance’s stance runs counter to his Christian faith.

“He claims to be a person of faith. I know my Bible. And my Bible teaches us that we are to love thy neighbor and we are to feed the hungry,” Shapiro said."

‘The damage is terrifying’: Barbara Kingsolver on Trump, rural America and the recovery home funded by her hit novel; The Guardian, July 5, 2025

Hannah Marriott, The Guardian ; ‘The damage is terrifying’: Barbara Kingsolver on Trump, rural America and the recovery home funded by her hit novel

"Rural life and the opioid crisis have not been sufficiently represented in fiction, she says. “Appalachian life in general has not been sufficiently represented. People don’t know the complexity and the nuance.” Appalachians represent “ecosystems of people, the people in need and the people who give; the Memaws (grandmothers) who take care of all the kids.” She dismisses one infamous account – vice president JD Vance’s 2016 memoir Hillbilly Elegy – as a book that was “really all about himself, how he got out and made good, and the people that stay behind, well, are just lazy”. Appalachian culture, she says, is about modesty and self-reliance. “If he were a real Appalachian, he wouldn’t tell that story.”...

“Charity is a very loaded concept. It involves a power imbalance. It is a person standing in a position of privilege saying: I will give this gift to you, and implicit is: ‘to help you become more like me’. Everything about that is odious to me.”...

Pride, denial and shame are longstanding Kingsolver fascinations. She says that the archetypal American story of the lone hero pulling themselves up by their bootstraps “is just bullshit. We have classes in this country. We have class barriers. There are places you can be born that you’re never going to get out of.” Still, she says, that myth is powerful: it “brainwashes” people; it can lead to self-blame...

She lives in Trump country, and says she understands how he “hooked” so many people, but she never demonises Trump voters herself, describing her neighbours as “some of the most generous, kindhearted people you will ever meet”. She has no kind words for the man himself. His presidency is, she says, “a circus. That’s too kind a word for it. Circuses make you laugh. This one makes you cry. It’s stunning how much damage one ignorant man can do.”

She points out that Trump’s “so-called Big Beautiful Bill” could be devastating for the region, with its cuts to the National Park Service, the Weather Service and disaster preparedness – just last year the area was hit by the devastating Hurricane Helene – and cuts to Medicaid, which could cause havoc in an already under-served area. “The damage will be unimaginable. Lots of people will die, lots of wild lands will be destroyed. The damage is terrifying.” Does she think her Trump-voting neighbours will change their allegiance if such terrors come to pass? “Will they connect the dots when our hospital closes? I don’t even know the answer to that,” she says, shaking her head, fearing that the TV and radio stations that told them to vote for Trump in the first place will “come up with some other reason why your hospital closed. For those of us who are in the information business, that’s a depressing subject.”...

In the long term, she says she believes in the Martin Luther King Jr quote that “the arc of the moral universe is long, but it bends toward justice”."

What did Pope Francis think of JD Vance? His view was more than clear; The Guardian, April 23, 2025

Jan-Werner Müller , The Guardian; What did Pope Francis think of JD Vance? His view was more than clear

"We might never quite know what Pope Francis said to the US vice-president during their very brief meeting on Sunday. In the widely shared video clip, it was hardly audible. The morning after, Francis died, and Vance jetted to visit India, finding time to tweet that his heart went out to the millions of Christians who loved Francis (implying, I suppose, that not all Catholics loved him) and patronizing the dead pontiff by calling one of his homilies “really quite beautiful”).

Francis had been as outspoken as could be without naming names, when he criticized Vance in his February letter to US bishops; but he was not just registering his rebuke of Trump and Vance’s cruel treatment of refugees and migrants; he was reacting to a broader trend of instrumentalizing religion for nationalist and authoritarian populism...

Francis, in a letter to US bishops, instructed the flock that “Christian love is not a concentric expansion of interests that little by little extend to other persons and groups. In other words: the human person is not a mere individual, relatively expansive, with some philanthropic feelings!”

He added, driving home the rebuke without naming names, that “the true ordo amoris that must be promoted is that which we discover by meditating constantly on the parable of the ‘Good Samaritan’ … that is, by meditating on the love that builds a fraternity open to all, without exception.” Apparently, Cardinal Pietro Parolin was dispatched on Saturday to explain all this to Vance again.

Vance is not the only far-right populist who has smuggled nationalism into what he touts as the correct notion of Christianity. Viktor Orbán, a great model for Vance and other self-declared US “post-liberals” (meaning: anti-liberals), has been declaring for years that a proper understanding of “Christian Democracy” is not only “illiberal”, but nationalist."

What Francis meant; The Ink, April 21, 2025

Anand Giridharadas, The Ink; What Francis meant

"Some of you will have followed Francis’s running dispute with Vice President (and Catholic convert) JD Vance; the Pope singled out Vance’s limited interpretations of scripture for criticism on multiple occasions, continuing into this past Easter Week.

On Easter weekend, Francis first sent church deputies to meet with Vance (who was in Italy last week, for meetings with right-wing ally Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni). Francis did finally meet briefly with Vance on Easter Sunday. The in-person meetings were reportedly cordial, though Francis’s criticism of U.S. immigration policy was reportedly on the table, and the Pope did call out the Trump regime in his final Good Friday address:

Today’s builders of Babel tell us that there is no room for losers, and that those who fall along the way are losers. Theirs is the construction site of hell. God’s economy, on the other hand, does not kill, discard or crush. It is lowly, faithful to the earth.

Francis was the rare leader, spiritual or political, who appeared to have taken the Bible literally and seriously. That brings with it plenty of baggage, but his successors, his followers, and people with all manner of religious affiliations or lack of affiliations in the U.S. and everywhere else, could do worse than to emulate his example."

Pope Francis met briefly with Vice President Vance on Sunday; NPR, April 21, 2025

 Joe Hernandez, Rachel Treisman, NPR; Pope Francis met briefly with Vice President Vance on Sunday

"Before he died, Pope Francis met briefly Sunday morning with Vice President Vance. Vance was in Italy over the weekend meeting with Italian officials and celebrating Easter with his family. Vance converted to Catholicism in 2019.

The Holy See Press Office said the pair exchanged Easter greetings in a private meeting that lasted for a few minutes.

In February, Pope Francis warned that the Trump administration's effort to dramatically ramp up deportations was driving a "major crisis." The pope also appeared to criticize Vance directly for claiming that Catholic doctrine justified such policies."

Trump executive order on Smithsonian targets funding for ‘improper ideology’; Associated Press via The Guardian, March 27, 2025

Associated Press via The Guardian; Trump executive order on Smithsonian targets funding for ‘improper ideology’

[Kip Currier: This Trump executive order is deeply disconcerting but not at all surprising: weeks ago, it was clear Trump 2.0 will target and attempt to reshape -- in its ideological image -- any institution that provides access to information, data, and the historical record, i.e. libraries, archives, and museums.]

[Excerpt]

"Donald Trump revealed his intentions to reshape the Smithsonian Institution with an executive order on Thursday that targets funding to programs with “divisive narratives” and “improper ideology”.

The president said there has been a “concerted and widespread” effort over the past decade to rewrite US history by replacing “objective facts” with a “distorted narrative driven by ideology rather than truth”.

He signed an executive order putting JD Vance in charge of an effort to “remove improper ideology” from the Smithsonian Institution, including its museums, education and research centers and the National Zoo.

Trump’s order specifically names the National Museum of African American History and Culture and the Women’s history museum, which is in development.

“Museums in our Nation’s capital should be places where individuals go to learn – not to be subjected to ideological indoctrination or divisive narratives that distort our shared history,” the order said."

How criticism of Zelensky's clothing made it to the Oval Office; BBC, March 1, 2025

Mike Wendling, BBC; How criticism of Zelensky's clothing made it to the Oval Office

"When the meeting was opened up to questions from reporters, one came from Brian Glenn, chief White House correspondent for conservative cable network Real America's Voice.

"Why don't you wear a suit?" Glenn asked. "You're at the highest level in this country's office, and you refuse to wear a suit.

"Do you own a suit?" he continued. "A lot of Americans have problems with you not respecting the dignity of this office."

The aggressive questioning marked the moment when the Ukrainian president – who until then seemed to be having a diplomatic, even friendly, conversation with Trump – first appeared tired and irritated.

"I will wear costume after this war will finish," Zelensky replied. (The word "suit" can be translated into Ukrainian as "kostyum".)"

The weekend the "Free World" died; The Ink, March 2, 2025

ANAND GIRIDHARADAS, The Ink; ESSAY: The weekend the "Free World" died

In the Oval Office fiasco, a country revealed

"Early in the afternoon on Friday, the president and the vice president of the United States delivered a contemptuous scolding to the wartime leader of Ukraine, Volodymyr Zelensky. The country of “Mr. Gorbachev, tear down this wall” and “We choose to go to the moon” and “rendezvous with destiny” had become the country of “You’re not in a good position. You don’t have the cards right now. With us, you start having cards.” It was a shocking, abusive scene, unlike any foreign policy chroniclers could recall. By Sunday, the British prime minister had declared that “we are at a crossroads in history,” and European countries were talking about a coalition of the willing to defend Ukraine. It was the weekend the notion of the “free world” died...

Toward the end of the meeting, Trump commented that the awful scene he had participated in would make great television. Here was the triumph of the spirit of attention-seeking at any cost, the spirit in which there are no values worth defending if they do not carry the possibility of making people watch you. Everyone is an influencer now; everyone covets followers more than friends. Trump trash-talked an erstwhile American ally because he knew it would do numbers with his followers.

In recent weeks, I have wondered why the leaders of other countries have not been brave in calling out the situation in the United States, in naming this fascist threat from within. The obvious answer is American power and leverage. It can be expensive to speak truth to superpower, as Zelensky will surely be learning in coming days.

But after the meltdown in the Oval Office on Friday, I began to wonder if another reason is involved. Maybe those leaders, like much of the world, do not look at America right now and see a country being hijacked by this dangerous leader. Maybe much of the world looks at a country that, in its bones, has fundamentally changed. Has lost that other spirit. Lost the sunniness, the hopefulness, the decency, the will to sacrifice, the idealism, the confidence, the hope.

What will stop Trump? everyone is asking all day long. Maybe an actual and effective form of resistance will involve more than the thwarting of a leader. It will be a cultural project up and down American life. To resist the meanness and smallness and cruelty and cynicism and solipsism. To insist, by showing, that what he is is not who we are."

It Was an Ambush: Today marked one of the grimmest days in the history of American diplomacy.; The Atlantic, February 28, 2025

 Tom Nichols, The Atlantic; It Was an Ambush

Today marked one of the grimmest days in the history of American diplomacy.

"Vance’s presence at the White House also suggests that the meeting was a setup. Vance is usually an invisible backbencher in this administration, with few duties other than some occasional trolling of Trump’s critics. (The actual business of furthering Trump’s policies is apparently now Elon Musk’s job.) This time, however, he was brought in to troll not other Americans, but a foreign leader. Marco Rubio—in theory, America’s top diplomat—was also there, but he sat glumly and silently while Vance pontificated like an obnoxious graduate student.

Zelensky objected, as he should have, when the vice president castigated the Ukrainian president for not showing enough personal gratitude to Trump. And then in a moment of immense hypocrisy, Vance told Zelensky that it was “disrespectful for you to come into the Oval Office and try to litigate this in front of the American media.” But baiting Zelensky into fighting in front of the media was likely the plan all along, and Trump and Vance were soon both yelling at Zelensky. (“This is going to be great television,” Trump said during the meeting.) The president at times sounded like a Mafia boss—“You don’t have the cards”; “you’re buried there”—but in the end, he sounded like no one so much as Putin himself as he hollered about “gambling with World War III,” as if starting the biggest war in Europe in nearly a century was Zelensky’s idea...

Trump might as well have dictated this post on Truth Social before the meeting, because Zelensky didn’t stand a chance of having an actual discussion at the White House. When he showed Trump pictures of brutalized Ukrainian soldiers, Trump shrugged. “That’s tough stuff,” he muttered. Perhaps someone told Zelensky that Trump doesn’t read much, and reacts to images, but Trump, uncharacteristically, seems to have been determined to stay on message and pick a fight...

The sheer rudeness shown to a foreign guest and friend of the United States was (to use a word) deplorable as a matter of manners and grace, but worse, Trump and Vance acted like a couple of online Kremlin sock puppets instead of American leaders. They pushed talking points that they either knew or should have known were wrong. Even if Zelensky were as fluent and capable in English as Winston Churchill, he would never have been able to rebut the flood of falsehoods."

World leaders back Zelenskyy following Trump, Vance Oval Office spat; Fox News, February 28, 2025

Caitlin McFall, Fox News; World leaders back Zelenskyy following Trump, Vance Oval Office spat

"European leaders came out with sweeping support for Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy following the explosive Oval Office meeting in which President Donald Trump and Vice President JD Vance gave harsh reprimands and accused him of being "disrespectful."

Several leaders took to social media to back Ukraine and to remind Washington that Russian President Vladimir Putin is the Russia-Ukraine conflict's "aggressor," not Zelenskyy."

Trump Thinks He Humiliated Zelensky. He Really Humiliated the United States; The Daily Beast, March 1, 2025

David Rothkopf, The Daily Beast; Trump Thinks He Humiliated Zelensky. He Really Humiliated the United States

"The Trump-Putin Axis came fully out of the closet today. 

The new U.S. administration has clearly embraced what might be called a “mob boss” foreign policy—because of the criminal pasts of the men who are leading it and because of the tactics they appear to favor.

In an Oval Office meeting with Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelensky, Donald Trump and his dangerously ill-informed yes-man, JD Vance, the U.S. president pressed for a deal to squeeze mineral assets out of Ukraine in exchange for some ill-defined level of continued support for that country that could only be described as extortionate...

It was an ugly display of foreign policy crudeness, the likes of which we have never seen in the White House. It is tempting to call it inept. But it was not. It achieved precisely the goal that Putin and Trump had long sought, to produce a public break between the United States and Ukraine that would directly and meaningfully support Russia’s illegal, brutal conquest of its neighbor.

Trump and Vance, however, were rebuffed by Zelensky in important ways. When the Americans sought to perpetuate lies that have been a staple of Kremlin propaganda and Trump campaign speeches, Zelensky stood up to them. He refuted the idea that Ukraine provoked Russia’s invasion.

Trump has made it clear that he would stop U.S. support for Ukraine and that he was sympathetic to Putin, a man who has sought both to deny Ukraine’s right to exist and to wipe the country from the map.

Unsurprisingly, Zelensky was not cowed by the two-bit goons who confronted him...

It is surely one of the darkest days in the history of American foreign policy...

But for all the embarrassment we feel at our president, we should not lose sight of the hugely embarrassing and damaging performance of JD Vance. Vance, like Trump, had virtually every fact wrong. Furthermore, he was completely out of line addressing a foreign head of state as he did, especially one who is one of the genuinely great heroes of our era and who has been fighting courageously not just on behalf of his own people, but in defense of the ideals and interests of the U.S. and our long-time European allies."