Political, foreign policy, and national security experts are expressing shock and outrage after President Donald Trump’s special envoy, real estate billionaire Steve Witkoff, met with Vladimir Putin on Friday at the Kremlin for the fourth time—entirely unaccompanied by any senior State Department officials, administration representatives, or policy experts—reportedly to discuss ending Russia’s unlawful war against the sovereign nation of Ukraine.
The Financial Times on Friday reported that critics describe Witkoff “as an innocent abroad, unskilled and unlettered in diplomacy. His fans say experience is overrated.”
“Being relatively uninformed about the issues, [Witkoff] took on board everything that a very charming Vladimir Putin told him,” former U.S. ambassador to Ukraine Steven Pifer told FT. Witkoff has “fallen into a trap,” Pifer also said, describing the Trump administration’s proposal to end Putin’s war against Ukraine as “blatantly pro-Russian.”
FT also notes that Ukraine has “long suspected Witkoff of pro-Russian sympathies.”
On Friday, FT’s Moscow bureau chief Max Seddon posted video of a smiling President Putin warmly greeting Witkoff, “in English, in the Kremlin.”
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“Putin,” Seddon noted, “is flanked by his top foreign policy advisor Yuri Ushakov and Kirill Dmitriev, head of Russia’s sovereign wealth fund.”
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Witkoff, as numerous experts pointed out, was accompanied by no one except an interpreter.
“Their side is helmed by a former KGB officer who’s negotiated with every U.S. President since Bill Clinton, along with his most trusted, experienced foreign policy and economic aides,” noted diplomat, political advisor, and former intelligence officer Ned Price. “Our side consists of a Manhattan real estate developer and his interpreter. What could go wrong?”
CNN Chief National Security Correspondent Alex Marquardt appeared to echo Price’s concerns.
“Yet again, Witkoff meets with Putin with no other senior US officials. While Putin has two of his closest aides. This is the 4th Witkoff-Putin meeting this year and Witkoff doesn’t appear to have taken a senior diplomat/intel/expert with him to any of them.”
Former Obama National Security Council official Tommy Vietor concurred, adding, “seems like quite a bad idea that someone as inexperienced as Witkoff takes these meetings with no staff present.”
But it was Fox News’ Chief National Security Correspondent Jennifer Griffin who blasted the Trump administration:
“Where are the subject matter experts with Witkoff? Putin, the KGB officer, is laughing,” Griffin noted. “Meanwhile the instability at the Pentagon is not helping project strength during these delicate negotiations. There is still no confirmed NSA [National Security Agency] (Cyber Command) director after Defense Secretary Hegseth fired Gen Hauck and his deputy for no reason, not even a nominee yet for the person overseeing the crown jewel of US intelligence and SIGINT, which might come into handy when you are negotiating with Putin and Xi.”
Meanwhile, historian Mike Coté, responding to the video, lamented, “By the end of this, we’re going to have ceded Alaska back to Russia.”
Christopher Steele, the British former intelligence officer and Russia expert, on Thursday had warned: “It’s hard to imagine a more dangerous approach to Moscow than that being pursued by Trump/Witkoff. Putin’s a murderous thug with imperial ambitions and totally untrustworthy. By selling out Ukraine, Trump will simply encourage further Russian aggression rather than secure peace.”
Paula Chertok, who writes about Russia and Ukraine at East/West Blog, responded to video of Witkoff walking on the streets of Moscow with his Russian friends.
“Witkoff is shopping in Moscow with Putin’s pals… while Ukraine is observing a Day of Mourning for Ukrainians massacred in Kyiv by Russia,” Chertok noted.
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Foreign policy expert and journalist Laura Rozen, added: “Looks like Witkoff with his girlfriend, and Dmitriev with his wife, strolling around Moscow with bodyguards.”
Veteran journalist and author Craig Unger, who has alleged President Trump is a Russian asset, accused him on Thursday of “throwing Ukraine under the bus so he can build Trump Tower Moscow. Witkoff has no experience in diplomacy but plenty when it comes to real estate.”
John Hardie, the Deputy Director of the Russia Program at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies (FDD), a non-partisan institution focusing on national security and foreign policy, also posted those videos.
Republican former U.S. Rep. Adam Kinzinger responded, writing: “I absolutely am ashamed of my government today. This is pure, unadulterated, evil.”
Watch the videos above or at this link.
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