President Donald Trump's characterization of Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky as a "dictator" who was responsible for Russia's invasion of his country has been met with little support among lawmakers of his own party.
The Trump-Zelensky relationship has seemingly devolved significantly over the last week as the president dispatched top diplomats to meet with their Russian counterparts in Saudi Arabia without including the Ukrainians. Trump himself then accused Zelensky of being responsible for the war that's nearing its third anniversary, to which the Ukrainian leader declared he was living in a "disinformation space."
Trump then called Zelensky “a dictator without elections” who “better move fast or he is not going to have a country left” in a social media post on Wednesday.
Several Republicans have disagreed with Trump's remarks over the previous couple of days.
Sen. Thom Tillis (R-NC) described Russian President Vladimir Putin as a "murderous dictator" who "started this war" and added, "There is no more equivalence between Vladimir Putin and President Zelensky. President Putin is evil, and he has to be stopped."
Sen. Roger Wicker (R-MS), the chairman of the Senate Armed Services Committee, told CNN, "Putin is a war criminal who should be in jail for the rest of his life, if not executed."
"What we can trust the Russians to do is to do anything to their advantage, to take temporary steps," he added. "Vladimir Putin has violated every tenant of international law and should be indicted and prosecuted and jailed, possibly executed."
Similarly, another Trump ally in Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-SC) said he "blame[s] Putin above all others," while Sen. John Cornyn (R-TX) told the Washington Examiner he "wouldn't use the same word" to describe Zelensky.
At the core of one of Trump's points is that Ukraine has not held elections since the war began nearly three years ago because the government imposed martial law, and elections are not allowed to be held under martial law in Ukraine. Zelensky's term should have ended last year.
“We have a situation where we haven’t had elections in Ukraine, where we have martial law, essentially martial law in Ukraine, where the leader in Ukraine, I mean, I hate to say it, but he’s down at 4% approval rating,” Trump said from Mar-a-Lago on Tuesday. “And where a country has been blown to smithereens, you got, most of the cities are laying on their sides. The buildings are collapsed.”
Trump did not cite a specific poll identifying Zelensky's approval rating as 4%, with several recent polls indicating Zelensky's approval rating among Ukrainians is actually above 50%.
Holding elections in Ukraine during the war would undoubtedly be difficult given roughly 20% of Ukraine is occupied by Russian forces, which held sham referendums to annex those regions.
Zelensky was elected in 2019, while Putin has served as either Russia's prime minister or president since 2000.
Both Zelensky and several European leaders expressed concern over their exclusion from Tuesday's meeting in Riyadh, where Secretary of State Marco Rubio, TMiddle East envoy Steve Witkoff, and national security adviser Mike Waltz met with Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov and Putin's foreign policy adviser, Yuri Ushakov.
“I think I have the power to end this war, and I think it’s going very well. But today I heard, ‘Oh, well, we weren’t invited.’ Well, you’ve been there for three years. You should have ended it three years,” Trump said. “You should have never started it. You could have made a deal.”
The president's remarks are not accurate given it was Russia, not Ukraine, that began the war.
Russia annexed Crimea in 2014, and then in 2022, Russia's military amassed more than 100,000 troops along the border before commencing what has turned into the bloodiest land war in Europe since World War II. Hundreds of thousands of soldiers have been killed on the battlefield over the course of the war. Russia's military alone has suffered more than 600,000 casualties during the war, a U.S. defense official said this fall.
Russian forces were expected to overthrow Zelensky and his government in a matter of weeks, but they had to shift their focus to the eastern and southern parts of Ukraine after failing to accomplish their overarching goals.
Two senior officials from Trump's first administration, whom the president has since shunned, also disagreed with his sentiment.
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Former Vice President Mike Pence said, "Russia launched an unprovoked and brutal invasion claiming hundreds of thousands of lives. The Road to Peace must be built on the Truth," while the president's former national security adviser John Bolton added, "Trump’s characterizations of Zelensky and Ukraine are some of the most shameful remarks ever made by a U.S. President. Our support of Ukraine has never been about charity, our way of life at home depends on our strength abroad."
Ramsey Touchberry contributed to this report.