Appearing on CNN's "State of the Union" on Sunday morning, Donald Trump's national security adviser continued the Trump administration's attacks on Volodymyr Zelensky by taking a new approach and complaining about the "body language" of Ukraine's president when he met with the president.
Speaking with host, Dana Bash, Mike Waltz, a former member of the House representing Florida, vociferously defended Trump and Vice President J.D. Vance for how they treated Zelensky after they called him "disrespectful" and demanded he thank them before assembled reporters.
'You know, it wasn't clear to us that President Zelensky was ready to negotiate in good faith towards an end to this war," Waltz accused. "You know, for us, kind of talking about the details and demands of security guarantees before, as President Trump said, 'Look, I don't know that we can get both sides to the table at this point.' And, you know, you can't kind of trash the other side going, you know, litigating through the history of this conflict."
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"Coming to the Oval Office, uh, you know, with the body language, the shaking of his head, the, you know, the kind of the arms crossed, uh, we just it we found it incredibly disrespectful," he continued. "We were ready to sign that deal."
Turning to a belief by a multitude of observers that Trump and Vance orchestrated an "ambush" for the TV cameras, Waltz insisted, "I want to address directly that this was some type of ambush. It is absolutely false! We had negotiated the minerals deal in the weeks prior. It was difficult, it was done and finalized and ready to be signed in the East Room."
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