Speaking on his peace talks with Russian President Vladimir Putin, Trump told reporters that Ukraine did not need a seat at the negotiating table because it "should've ended [the war] in three years. You should have never started it. You could have made a deal."

And Trump’s attack on Zelensky, who was hailed as a hero in the United States for resisting Russia’s Blitzkrieg on Kyiv early in the war, was a graphic sign of how the new American administration has reversed Washington’s stance of supporting the victim of the invasion and is now rewarding the aggressor.