A stunned analyst Wednesday said that a Trump administration official coached Russia on how to win over President Donald Trump in the proposed peace plan between Russia and Ukraine.
Trump envoy Steve Witkoff is facing criticism over his handling of the negotiations with Russia to end the conflict in Ukraine, which has been considered overly favorable to Russia. The unusual move was questioned by Ben Rhodes, former Deputy National Security advisor in the President Barack Obama administration, in a conversation with MS NOW's Chris Jansing on Wednesday.
"It's unthinkable that we'd have a situation like this where it feels like the Russians kind of brought their own maximalist surrender plan, essentially for Ukraine to Witkoff thinking that he would be, you know, essentially a friendly voice inside the administration. And then we subsequently learned that, as you know, Marco Rubio is over there trying to make this a little bit more balanced and still overwhelmingly favoring Russia," Rhodes said.
Rhodes explained that the scenario would never have happened during the Obama administration.
"You've got, you know, Witkoff coaching the Russians on how to flatter trump to get him on their side before he talks to Zelenskyy. I mean, I could see a scenario in which you might coach an ally, you know, about how to enter negotiations, not how to handle your own president, but how to deal with negotiations. But it's truly extraordinary that we're kind of so far through the looking glass here, Chris, that we have a close associate of the president, United States, coaching Russia on how to get the best terms possible in a quote unquote peace deal that is essentially validating their invasion of Ukraine," Rhodes added.