Will they meet in the middle? John Thomas says preobably not

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
I feel like this is the song they played after
the liaison. Steve wood Cooff and the Putin's buddies over
there shook hands and left the conference room where they
just had a big meeting, joined us not to talk
about this. John Thomas, who is a Republican strategist with
ness point, John, welcome back in. So here we go again.

(00:20):
I guess everything went well with Steve Woodkoff and the
summit between Putin and you know, the President could be
happening as soon as next week. They're saying now because
they got him back together, all right, let's get together
and talk about this some more. The missing element in
all of this potential Let's call it a day in
this war with Ukraine. Oh Zelenski, I don't think he's

(00:43):
on board with giving up any territory to get a
piece deal. And I would imagine that's Putin's you know,
card that he has to have.

Speaker 2 (00:51):
Oh, you're right, Although what I would say is I
think President Trump at least had a productive dialogue early
on with Zolensky and felt that he could kind of
has leverage over Zolensky to make some kind of deal,
primarily because Lensky needs the US's money to continue this endeavor.

(01:11):
I think what President Trump felt up until he made
this announcement with the wit Coff summit was that Putin
just didn't want a deal, He wouldn't make a deal.
And Trump has started to apply pressure on Putin by
sanctioning other countries that buy his oil. And I think
that's kind of the big takeaway here, which is President

(01:34):
excuse me a Vladimir Putin only really responds to pressure
and not tough talk or anything like that. And I
think finally the pressure is mounting enough that it looks
like there's an opportunity for President Trump to cover the table.
Now if he gets Putin where he wants, does Zolensky
go along? You know? Tbd? But I think Trump feels

(01:57):
he can handle Violinsky a little bit more easily then
Putin is a bit more mercurial. So if you've got
him in an opportunity to get to move Putin, you
do it.

Speaker 1 (02:07):
Last time they had to one of these meetings, cue
the Russian missiles to land in Ukraine in three to
you know, I'm surprised that after they left the room
that there wasn't something else going on. It happened last time,
and we certainly saw the Zelensky oval office meeting that
went sideways, and he has since kind of you know,
regrouped and figured that, oh, maybe I overstepped. But Zelensky

(02:28):
has still kind of got his you know, heels dug
in in that he doesn't want to get up this territory. Uh,
will Putin compromise more than Zelensky in this whole situation here,
because in a big picture, the sanctions and everybody associated
with buying any Russian products in Russia doing any other
business around the globe, that's going to clamp down on
their economy there. So who do you think makes the

(02:50):
greater sacrifice if in fact they do come to a decision.

Speaker 2 (02:55):
It's a great point. I think that Putin can only
withstand the economic pressure so long. So it's very possible
to your point that Putin makes more concessions than the Lensky.
But the good news for Trump is he has other
levers against Lensky. It's primarily just our funding lever because

(03:17):
Lensky can't afford to fund his conflict. But remember this
is really, I think also a great lesson in leadership
because President Trump did's this didn't start under President Trump's watch.
This probably wouldn't have started if President Trump were president
at the time, because it really was Putin taking advantage

(03:40):
of the US's weakness on the global stage under Joe
Biden that he could get away with it. And now
Trump has to come in here and clean this mess up,
and it ain't easy.

Speaker 1 (03:49):
Well, you're right about that, he's cleaned up how much
of it already from the Biden administration, the border of
the situation with Israel and Gaza still going on. I mean,
there's a lot of things that this previous administration left,
you know, over there in the toilet for Donald Trump
to clean up. So I think we, you know, we're

(04:10):
closer than we've been with this Russia Ukraine situation right now,
based on what he had to say yesterday on truth Socially,
he said, my Special ENVOYE. Steve Wikoff just had a
highly productive meeting with Russian President Vladimir Putin. Great progress
was made. So with that set and everything with the
tariffs and Putin starting to understand Okay, well they're starting
to clamp down on me. Maybe we'll get there this time.
But like you said, TBD.

Speaker 2 (04:31):
Right, TVD. But you know, you got to give President
Trump some efforts. He's not quitting, he keeps, he continues
to try, and I'll remain optimistic. Look, if there's anybody
who could get these parties to the table and make
a deal, it would be Trump, no doubt one.

Speaker 1 (04:49):
I'll give him the credit on that one too. And
you thank you, John Thomas. I appreciate you. We'll do
it again.