How to Advocate for Ukraine in the Trump Era - Part 1
After last week, Ukraine advocates are declaring the world's end. Take Trump seriously, but not literally. Otherwise, you will develop a dependence on anti-anxiety medicine and whiskey.
My Signal and WhatsApp are blowing up with people messaging me about the Trump Administration’s comments last week. My LinkedIn feed is consumed with people declaring the end of the world.
What Happened Last Week
For those who may have missed it, Trump talked to Putin and posted on Truth Social flattering things about Putin. He was less flattering of Zelensky and Ukraine.
Newly-minted Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth, whose boss wrote The Art of the Deal, gave up two negotiating points to Putin in a news conference without getting anything in return that I can figure out.
“…we must start by recognizing that returning to Ukraine's pre-2014 borders is an unrealistic objective,” Hegseth said. Later in the news conference, he said “…the United States does not believe that NATO membership for Ukraine is a realistic outcome of a negotiated settlement.”
What has gone mostly unnoticed is the negative feedback Hegseth has received for his comments.
To put last week in context, let me start with an American football analogy.
Some people who view themselves as Ukraine advocates yet are declaring the end of the world on social media and in news interviews are punting on first down.
In American football the team on offense has four attempts to advance the ball ten yards. These attempts are called "downs." Typically, if you can't get the ball ten yards down the field in three attempts - three downs - you punt on fourth down. You kick the ball as far down the field as you can.
You give up.
If we are punting on first down, that means that we have given up before making the first attempt to move the ball down the field
Has anything been signed? I don't think anything has. Trump said things we don't like. Last month, Trump said things we do like.
Here is an important thing to remember about Trump: take him seriously, but not literally. If you get worked up about everything that Trump says, you will develop a dependence on anti-anxiety medicine and whiskey.
In 2017, the healthcare world was similarly doom-watching, but the industry launched a full court press to get Trump and his supporters information that favored their point of view. Nobody called him names. Nobody punted on first down. At some point Trump said “Nobody knew health care could be so complicated.” Health care remains complicated.
More famously, Trump said that he would build a wall on the southern border and make Mexico pay for it. The wall remains incomplete and, to the best of my knowledge, we have gotten not even a Tijuana street taco in compensation. But pressure to solve the crisis at the border remains.
Our job as advocates is to assume that if Trump had good information, he would make good decisions. We have evidence to support this. Last month, he was getting good information and he said things we liked. Last week, the people who are giving him bad information had his ear.
Hegseth’s comments not well received
Hegseth is already receiving negative feedback. Sen. Roger Wicker chairs the Senate Armed Services Committee. Every year, his committee passes a bill telling Pete Hegseth what to do. Wicker is essentially Hegseth’s boss in Congress. One of at least four members of Congress with whom he wants to have a good relationship.
Wicker is asking publicly what the heck Hegseth was thinking for giving away two negotiating points to Putin.
Some excerpts from Wicker:
“I don’t know who wrote <Hegseth’s> speech — it is the kind of thing Tucker Carlson could have written, and Carlson is a fool.”
“Everybody knows … and people in the administration know, you don’t say before your first meeting what you will agree to and what you won’t agree to.”
“There are good guys and bad guys in this war, and the Russians are the bad guys.”
I have never met Hegseth and don’t know much about him. It seems he is learning a lot in a short period of time about being a government official. Having never been in elected office, he doesn’t have staff he knows well and trusts, and one of the new guys wrote him a speech that he had to walk back. Saying you mis-spoke publicly is always embarrassing. He also may not yet have the political instincts to understand how such a speech may blow back on him. And he certainly figured out that he needs to spend more time talking to Senator Wicker.
Wicker called it a “rookie mistake.” I’ll go with that.
Wicker is one of many Senators who seem willing to lose an election over Ukraine. Let's empower him. There is a battle for Trump's ear. Let's help the people who are on our side.