Trump has no interest in -- and no understanding of -- geopolitics. He doesn't care what happens to Ukraine. He wants a Nobel Peace Prize, but he wants it for the same reason he wants a trophy wife: so he can show his prize off to the world as a mark of his greatness.
He's in a dick-measuring contest with other presidents, specifically with Barack Obama and Joe Biden, so Putin threw him a bone and said what he wanted to hear:
Russian President Vladimir Putin said he agreed with Donald Trump's claim that the war in Ukraine would not have ever even begun if he had not lost the 2020 election and was serving as president when the carnage began, instead of former President Joe Biden.Last night, Trump told Sean Hannity that Putin agrees with many of his election conspiracy theories:
"I can confirm that," Putin said at the tail-end of a press conferece that took place Friday evening after the pair met for a summit at Joint Base Elmendorf-Richardson in Anchorage, Alaska....
"I'd like to add one more thing," Putin said, as the two heads of state provided remarks to the press, according to a translation of the Russian president's address. "I'd like to remind you that in 2022, during the last contact with a previous administration, I tried to convince my previous American colleague that the situation should not be brought to a point of no return when it would come to hostilities and I said it quite directly back then that it's a big mistake. Today, when President Trump is saying that if he was the president back then there would be no war – I am quite sure that it would indeed be so. I can confirm that."
Trump: "Vladimir Putin said something- one of the most interesting things. He said 'your election was rigged because you have mail in voting. It's impossible to have mail in voting & have honest elections.' He said that to me because we talked about 2020. He said, 'you won that election by so much'"
— Aaron Rupar (@atrupar.com) August 15, 2025 at 9:28 PM
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We don't have any evidence that this conversation actually took place, but since Putin actually did echo Trump's often-repeated talking point that he could have prevented the Ukraine war, unlike President Biden, it's conceivable that Putin listened to Trump blather on about "the steal" and said, "Oh yes, Donald, you're so right about that."
All of this costs Putin nothing, keeps Trump wrapped around his finger, and allows Americans in the right-wing bubble to continue arguing that Trump Is Right About Everything and Democrats are history's greatest monsters, as even the wily Russian dictator concedes.
Which is what Republican voters want. It's all they want. They care about this much more than they care about ending the war.
I've been telling you since the Bush years that right-wing voters hate their domestic political enemies more than they hate anyone else. They cheered on the Iraq War because they knew that many elected Democrats and much of the Democratic rank-and-file didn't want it. They wanted the Epstein files released (until they suddenly didn't) because they thought only Democrats (and people presumed to be Democrats' global elitist allies) would be implicated. And now they want Trump to be a Nobel-worthy peacemaker because they're certain his diplomatic success would own us.
Sure, they hated Al Qaeda and ISIS -- but they convinced themselves that we liked them, and that defeating them would be a defeat for us. They still think all Muslims are terrorists, which the exception of a small handful who are publicly on their side, and they think New York City is about to make Zohran Mamdani mayor because the libs like terrorism (just as our London counterparts have elected and reelected Sadiq Khan). They hate people of color and dark-skinned immigrants, but they believe this would be a proudly white country if it weren't for the damn libs.
Putin gets it. Putin didn't just work the con on Trump, he worked it on the entire Republican voter base.
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