There's no justifying Trump's comments on Zelenskyy. But he can remedy them by doing right by Ukraine.

Unwilling to walk back his insane comments on Zelenskyy, Trump can still rescue the situation by engineering a peace deal that Ukraine can accept.

So great is the determination to prove that Donald Trump can do no wrong, or so great is the fear that he is keeping score and one better keep one’s thoughts to oneself, that otherwise reasonably intelligent people are rushing to his defense on Ukraine. But Trump’s view is comically untenable. Zelenskyy is categorically not to blame for aggression against Ukraine. Putin is. Trump's view of Zelenskky as a “dictator” is mindboggling wrong. When the usually pro-Trump New York Post calls out the obvious, you have a problem.

Some have tried to excuse Trump’s egregious comments about Zelenskyy as trolling. They are not. Otherwise, why would he double down on them? Others have come to Trump’s defense by calling Zelenskky corrupt. They cite The Panama Papers or Tucker Carlson. But the facts contradict those claims. According to the Center for Strategic and International Studies, $175.2 billion has been allocated to Ukraine. Most of that aid has been delivered, including replacement equipment sent from U.S. military stockpiles, training of Ukrainian personnel, the cost of surging U.S. troops to Europe in response to Russia's aggression, intelligence support for Ukraine and NATO, and for the Department of Energy to safeguard nuclear materiel. Most of the remainder has been obligated through binding contracts. It will take many years for all the money to be disbursed. While it’s understandable that Zelenskky might claim he’s received only $75 billion in direct military aid, he is leaving out the assistance that has yet to arrive and monies spent to enable the Ukraine effort that is not explicitly tied to Ukraine.

Whatever corruption there is in Ukraine––several audits by the State Department and DOD have found it to be de minimis––it is far outweighed by the stakes in this war. Zelenskky is on the right side of history. Russia must not be allowed to win, period.

I am hesitant to draw analogies to Nazi Germany, having seen how Democrats preposterously abused that analogy in the presidential campaign against Trump. But the parallels are unmistakable. In the current conflict, Trump is Neville Chamberlain in Munich. He is about to hand over Ukraine as appeasement to a clear aggressor. At the very least, he is FDR at Yalta, yielding to Russian demands for Eastern Europe. Either way, Ukraine is not some pawn in a larger game of great power politics.

I am not sure what Secretary of State Rubio is up to in Riyadh, but he is not standing up to Putin. He’s looking to reward Putin by bringing him back into the Group of 7 without the Russian dictator doing one thing to deserve this reward. It’s wrong. It’s spineless. And it sets a horrible precedent. All freedom-loving Americans must oppose it.

One does not have to hate Trump or his policies to oppose his actions here strongly. Even with the mistakes regarding some employees in some departments—which Musk is ostensibly correcting––the overall direction of DOGE is correct. Trump’s work to deport illegal immigrant felons is necessary. My only worry is that he is not going far and fast enough.

It’s a sign of a free and open mind to push back when Trump goes too far. Here, he has not only gone too far, but he has left the reservation. Yet there’s still a chance for Trump to remedy his deranged comments with action. No matter how much he’s “tired of listening,” he needs to step inside Zelenskyy’s shoes. The Ukrainian President is not willing to forgive Russian aggression against Ukraine by rewarding it with a unilateral Ukrainian promise to disarm, and huge tranches of territory. Certainly not the amount of territory that a ceasefire with current borders entails. And he’s not willing to mortgage his country’s future with a deal that allows Russia to regroup and rearm only to attack again.

The kind of deal that Zelenskky might accept is a total withdrawal of Russian troops with a Ukrainian return of the Russian territory Kursk and then a buffer zone policed by international monitors. The sooner that Trump can get to work on that kind of deal, the sooner we can forget his colossal missteps to date.