'Not a great sign': White House sparks concern as it obsesses on Zelensky's dress sense
MSNBC's Jonathan Lemire flagged some new reporting that could be an ominous sign for President Donald Trump's meeting with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky.
The last time Zelensky met with Trump at the White House, back in February, the president and Vice President JD Vance bashed him for wearing his standard military-style clothing instead of a suit. The "Morning Joe" co-host noted that administration officials had pushed him to dress more formally when the two meet again on Monday.
"We saw when there was a brief pause in U.S. intelligence after that February Oval Office meeting between Trump and Zelensky, Russia made a lot of inroads right then – Zelensky, Ukraine flying blind," Lemire said. "So that would be a key part of this. It's ill-defined, we don't know what the security guarantees would be. Trump has signaled he's open to some. We're going to learn a lot today. It's simply, there's an air of mystery here, and the Europeans we talked about earlier have built this as one of the most important summits, meetings they've had since World War II, in terms of the future of Europe."
"We also should note our friends at Axios reporting that the White House has asked the Ukrainians whether Zelensky would wear a suit to the White House today, because that was a source of contention back in February, too," Lemire added. "That's perhaps not a great sign. It's unclear what their answer would be, but there's a lot at stake. It all ramps up this afternoon."
Zelensky will be flanked by NATO Secretary General Mark Rutte, European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen and the leaders of multiple European countries to seek a ceasefire in Russia's invasion of Ukraine, but sources told Axios the suit issue remains a point of contention for the White House.
"It would be great if he wore a tie but we don't expect him to," said a Trump adviser.
Sources told the website that Zelensky would wear the same black jacket he wore to a NATO summit in the Netherlands in June, which officials said pleased Trump, but he did not wear a tie then and was not expected to at the White House, which could annoy the vice president.
"The tie thing was a JD thing when it first happened," the Trump adviser said.
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