Trump, a treason to Ukraine and the West that many conservatives reject

To find out how Ukraine has received the shameful ambush against Zelensky yesterday at the White House, just read what they are saying.

Trump's shameful attitude towards Zelensky: rudeness to the victim and praise to the aggressor
The lessons Trump is teaching with his handling of the Russian invasion of Ukraine

Last night, the Ukrainian newspaper Kyiv Independent published an editorial stating the following:

It’s time to say it plainly. America’s leadership has switched sides in the war. The American people have not, and they should speak up.

In the past several weeks, the U.S. leadership has demonstrated explicit hostility towards Ukraine and aligned its rhetoric and policy with Russia.

The animosity culminated today when U.S. President Donald Trump and Vice President JD Vance berated Ukraine’s President Volodymyr Zelensky at a meeting in the Oval Office.

After a hostile meeting, Zelensky left the White House. Trump reportedly ordered the Ukrainian delegation out.

Let this sink in. The president of a battered Ukraine, an ally of the U.S., became the first world leader in history to be kicked out of the White House. Not a dictator, not a disgraced politician — the president of Ukraine, a country suffering from the worst invasion in the 21st century. The country that the U.S. administration swore to bring peace to.

The Kyiv Independent adds:

Will Trump and Vance hit Vladimir Putin with the same attitude they showed towards Zelensky and scold the Russian leader for attacking Ukraine? By now, we’ve seen enough to know for sure that they won’t. If any ring-kissing happens in their meeting with Putin, the ring will be Russian.

During the heated exchange in the Oval Office, Trump even complained that Zelensky has “hatred” for Putin — the man who ordered an invasion of his country, killing thousands of civilians — saying it would be “tough” for him to “make a deal with that kind of hate.”

What happened yesterday was the staging of a betrayal of the West by the Trump administration. It is not only a betrayal of the United States' allied countries, but also of the country itself, whose president treated Zelensky yesterday with a contempt that he has never shown towards Putin, which is very revealing about Trump's preferences in international matters. Preferences that we already saw a few days ago when The United States voted with Russia and North Korea at the UN against a resolution condemning the Russian invasion of Ukraine.

From a conservative perspective, what Trump is doing is favoring the enemies of the West. It matters little now that some try to convince us of the wisdom of this betrayal by claiming that Trump is developing an "anti-woke" agenda in his country. That conservative agenda does not justify Trump’s favor for Putin’s terrorist regime, which has been promoting the radical left in the West and which is allied with some of the countries that most harshly persecute Christians, such as North Korea, China, and Iran.

What Trump has done is not to open a peace process, but a process to force Ukraine to surrender to the Russian invader, to a criminal regime that has committed all kinds of atrocities against the Ukrainian people. Trump's actions are aimed at allowing Putin to profit from these crimes and that is immoral, even if many supporters of this indignity are Christians and boast about it.

Personally, I find it heartbreaking to see the support that many conservatives are giving Trump without the slightest hint of criticism for his repeated lack of respect for Ukraine and for his alignment with Russia. This support is one of the biggest disappointments I have had in years, because it shows that the solid principles that some promised are giving way to cynical appeals to "realism", an attitude that is increasingly similar to that of the communist Pablo Iglesias when he spoke of "riding contradictions", a cynical expression to defend one thing and do the opposite.

I can assure you that many conservatives reject what Trump is doing and are indignant at his alignment with Russia. The approval that we may deserve for the measures that Trump is taking in his country against the ideological impositions of the left does not mean that we have to swallow his betrayal of the West. In fact, with his favors to Russia, Trump is opening up the conservative movement, creating a division that will be difficult to close. Appealing to how bad "globalist" politicians are is no excuse to justify what Trump is doing with Ukraine.

I have been supporting the cause of Ukraine for years and my principles have not changed. I will continue to defend the need to provide military support to that country invaded by the Putin regime, because a Russian victory would only encourage future aggression against other European countries. If this threat to peace and security in Europe no longer matters to some conservatives, that is their problem. Of course, any party that is complicit in this betrayal of the West will not have my vote, no matter how many contortions it makes to justify it and even if that means returning to the blank vote.

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Photo: Jim Lo Scalzo.