Piers Morgan Uncensored - Top Trump Advisor Jason Miller Says President Could be DONE With Zelensky

Episode Date: March 3, 2025

After a highly amicable meeting with the UK Prime Minister Keir Starmer, American President Donald Trump held a similar meeting with Zelensky - but the terms weren't quite as friendly. The world leaders interrupted each other and, to put it mildly, loudly disagreed on the prospect of a ceasefire. Vice President JD Vance also directly scolded the Ukrainian President for not thanking the US. The resounding consensus was that the meeting could not have gone worse. For an autopsy of this historic falling out, Piers Morgan speaks to President Trump’s senior advisor Jason Miller as well as author Scott Horton, senior political correspondent at Puck News Tara Palmeri, Sunday Times correspondent Matthew Syed and founder of Outkick Clay Travis. Uncensored is proudly independent and supported by: Field of Greens: Visit https://BrickHouseNutrition.com/PIERS for 20% off your first order Tax Network USA: CALL 1-800-958-1000 or visit https://TNUSA.com/PIERS to meet with a strategist today for FREE Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

I'll be honest with you and you can clip this and people are going to go crazy. I trust Vladimir Putin more than I do the media coverage. Who wears a track suit to meet with the President of the United States? I know I'm not sure if President Trump would even take his call. He very well may have completely sabotaged his relationship with the United States at this point. Try to find an American who can name you a single city in Latvia, Lithuania or Estonia, put America first. Which is the most risible assertion that I think I've ever heard.

on television. It's always the pencil neck dork with the four eyes. Well, how do you face the charge of being a daught? Well, I accept it, so I am a bit of a dought. How are you going to disallow it without sending in the American Army and Navy? Well, that is a very good question. I mean, Matthew... Answer it.

President Trump's Oval Office blowout with President Zelensky was everything that everyone has said about it, no matter which side you're on. Extraordinary, shocking, unedifying, unprecedented. You spent the weekend under a rock. Well, here's a refresher for you. And do you think that it's respectful to come to the Oval Office of the United States of America and attack the administration

that is trying to prevent the destruction of your country? A lot of questions. Don't tell us what we're going to feel. We're trying to solve a problem. Don't tell us what we're going to feel. I'm not doing. You're in no position to dictate what we're going to feel. Wait a minute, no, no, you've done a lot of talking.

Your country is in big trouble. I know. We gave you through the stupid president, And $350 billion. You didn't have our military equipment. This war would have been over in two weeks. You have to be thankful. You don't have the cards.

You're buried there. Your people are dying. You're running low on soldiers. Listen, then you tell us, I don't want to cease fire. I don't want to cease fire. I've empowered you to be a tough guy. And I don't think you'd be a tough guy without the United States. And your people are very brave.

But you're either going to make a deal or we're out. Well, what happened next is almost, if not more consequential. Zelensky through the UK, were an extraordinary summit of 18 world leaders, most of him expressed unequivocal support for Ukraine. He also met King Charles, noted to be wearing a very similar outfit to the one he chose for the White House. It caused a bit of a stir. And in words that will have been music to mager ears, the Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk said this. 500 million Europeans are asking 300 million Americans, to defend them against 140 million Russians.

Well, quite. Now, the US could not be clearer that it wants Europe to raise this game on defending Europe. Now European leaders appear to be finally getting that memo. Zelensky's decision to fight his corner on the Oval Office has raged many Republicans, but his popularity has rocketed at the same time at home and in Europe. Trump supporters, meanwhile,

a thrill that the president and Vice President Vance took him to task in full public view. Maybe everybody actually got a bit of what they really wanted, whether it should have happened or not. And for those claiming that Trump is naive or even mercenary for thinking he can make a peace deal with Putin, well, listen to a clip that was sent to me from an interview I did with President Bill Clinton

about 10 years ago, in which he told me how he dealt with Vladimir Putin. I think the right strategy most of the time is, but it's frustrating to people in your line of work. You should be brutally honest with people in private. And then if you want them to help you, to avoid embarrassing them in public. Now sometimes they do things which make it impossible for you to keep quiet.

But by and large, I found all the people I dealt with appreciated it if I told them the truth. And they also appreciated it when I didn't kick them around in public for as long as I couldn't kick them around. So that's my experience. Did Putin ever renege on a personal agreement he made to you? He did not. So behind closed doors he could be trusted? trusted. He kept his word and all the deals we made. Interesting, isn't it? But the Trump

wants peace, not war, and he's in the habit of getting what he wants. Well, joining me now, as the author of provoked, how Washington started the new Cold War with Russia and the catastrophe in Ukraine, Scott Horton, the senior political correspondent of Puck News, Tara Palmieri, author and Times columnist Matthew Saeed, and the founder of Outkick, Clay Travis. Well, welcome to all of you. Tara, let me start with you as you're making your uncensored debut. Thank you. very much indeed for coming on. We appreciate it. Yeah, thanks for having. But I found that clip of Bill Clinton. Someone sent it to me, and I looked at the longer version of it.

It was interesting, because it was many, many years, obviously, after Clinton had last had to deal with Putin. Then he crossed over for quite a brief period. But it was interesting that he said that if you whack Putin in public as the US president, it's not going to work. And that behind the scenes, if you get an agreement with him, and we don't even know if Trump has that, but if he has got an agreement, that interestingly, you've got a Democrat president saying Putin and his experience would always keep his word

when it comes to that kind of personal agreement with an American president. What did you make of that? Yeah, I mean, we've seen American presidents flirt with Putin before. You remember George W. Bush said, I looked into his soul. So it's a tactic that's been taken with Putin is to try to relate to him,

to try to over-inflate him, to try to create a friendship and a bond so that he will uphold his side of the bargain. Now, does Putin always do that? No. But at the same time, I mean, this is the tactic that Donald Trump wants to take right now. He sees the flattery of Vladimir Putin as a way to possibly get him to uphold his side of the bargain. Now, we have to see what happens. He also tried that with Kim Jong-un, right?

And he thinks that he can sort of negotiate with these dictators, with these world leaders. The only thing that I would say is, why would he go in a... attack, you know, Vladimir Zelensky so publicly, even before this blow up this real housewife style showdown in the middle of the Oval Office, before that he was calling him a dictator. It seemed like he was really trying to rush him into this mineral deal and make it look like it was a shakedown of the Ukrainians, even though it wasn't a very significant deal, in my opinion. And then, you know, to bring them all there and sort of try to humiliate Zelensky, maybe he's doing that for Putin. He knows that Putin loves it and liked it and he thinks Slavis stronger

negotiating him with Putin? I don't know, but I think he thinks he can create some sort of friendship with him in the same way that other presidents have tried to do. We'll see if he's actually able to do this. Yeah, I mean, Clay Travis, what's interesting is when you watch the television news, say, in the UK, post that bust up in the Oval Office, and you compare it to what I watched on, say, Fox News this morning. Very, very different take on what happened. A lot of Americans feeling that Zelensky did disrespect Trump and J.D. Vance, a lot of people outside of America, feeling it was the other way around. For what it's worth, my take was,

I bet this is the kind of fiery debate they have a lot behind the scenes, particularly about warfare. We just don't normally see it on camera. I don't always pick the healthiest food options, and I'm sure you don't either. We're all human and we're all busy. That's why doctors created Field of Greens.

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we've got a modern-day Maginot line that's been created, trench warfare, neither side is moving very much. Yet we've had hundreds of thousands of people killed and wounded on both sides, and that's continuing to this day. I actually think the clip that you played with Bill Clinton is super fascinating, and I wanted to kind of build on what Tara said and also what you said, Pierce. Think about this. Let's think about the interpersonal relationship between Donald Trump and Vladimir Putin, right? These guys have to talk. They have to meet. If you are Trump and you had to choose, who do you trust more? Vladimir Putin or the left-wing legacy media that accused you of only winning the 2016 election

because Russia bought $100,000 or so in Facebook ads and they alleged that you were somehow a Manchurian candidate for Russia. And you knew that none of that was true and all of the steel dossier came out. and the way they covered you, sometimes, and again, I'm kind of diving into the psychology here, but I do think it's important. Sometimes even when you don't have a great relationship, when people have lied about your relationship and you know it to be untrue, that can lead to you trusting each other more. And I'll be honest with you, and you can clip this and people are going to go crazy. I trust Vladimir Putin more

than I do the media coverage of Trump's relationship. with Vladimir Putin in the United States in 2016, 2017, 2018. That doesn't mean I think Vladimir Putin is a great guy or that I in some way believe that he should have invaded Ukraine. He never should have. But remember, he didn't invade while Trump was president. As soon as Trump was gone, he suddenly did. That suggests to me that he actually respects Trump and what Trump might do and feared that more than he did Joe Biden. And that mutual respect means that I think we could get a solution here. And final thought, when you mediate, and I've had to mediate as a warrior a lot over the years, peers, or probably some people out there

when you get divorced, nobody comes in and they say, the other side is evil. You are 100 percent right. And the other side is evil. You are a paragon of virtue. You're all that's good in the world. In order to meet some sort of agreement, you have to presume that neither side is 100% pure and that neither side is 100% evil. It seems to me like some people just want Trump to say, Vladimir Putin is evil over and over again. And Trump is saying, wait, do you want a solution? Do you want a ceasefire? Do you want peace or not? Because if that's your goal, that is not the public posture that I can adopt. And I think that's a big part of this story.

I think Trump is more likely to get us peace than Biden was by far, even if it might sometimes be a bit messy bull in a China shop style in the meantime. Okay, Matthew, you were shaking your head. I don't think in unanimous agreement with what you were hearing there. So why are you so objecting to what Clay's? Because I thought a lot of what he said made, it could make sense. I mean, we don't really know, but it could make sense. Well, I wanted to make a couple of points, if I may.

The first is I don't know when the interview between you and Clinton took place, but I'm guessing before 2014. It was. Clinton was one of the signatures to the Budapest memorandum in 1994, where Ukraine agreed to give up its nuclear weapons in a treaty with the UK and the US and Russia, and he breached it after 2014. That was the key deceit. He played for time.

He took us for a ride. And I think if you were to re-interview Clinton now, he would say that he was completely shafted along with the rest of the signatures and most particularly the Ukrainian people. Putin is a bully. The psychology, I think, is completely clear to most right-minded people around the world.

And the only signal that bullies respect is not words on bits of paper, but steal. You have to stand up to them. I think we were way too slow in giving Ukraine the weapons that is. need, not necessarily to win the war, but to send a signal to Putin that he needed to sue for a reasonable case. But given we are where we are today, and Trump has inherited this as of January 20th, you know, I had a conversation with the president a few days before the

inauguration, and he'd just been told about the death numbers on the battlefield in this Ukraine war, and he was genuinely horrified. It was something like, I think he said it publicly a few days ago. It's about 100,000 people had died in six weeks on both sides. And he said it was like the killing fields of the First World War. We just had rolling open fields and people mowing each other down. And he was genuinely, in my conversation with him, genuinely determined to stop this. So I do think it's an interesting thing where the left or the liberal world, if you like, are all going completely nuts at Trump again, as they often do. And yet here you have a Republican President who genuinely seems to me from the moment he first came to power and now is somebody

who prefers peace to war, which is unusual for Republican presidents. Well, look, I completely agree with Trump's analysis that Europe has free-ridden on American taxpayers for decades. Trump wasn't the first to warn about it. Eisenhower did. Kennedy gave a speech about it. Reagan, Clinton, Obama even talked about it. And Europe have serially failed to step up. Effectively, American taxpayers, And I think in particular of the blue-collar workers, some of the most hardworking people in the world, have funded European welfare states.

I agree with that analysis. But I'll just say this. Zelensky and Ukraine are fighting for their country. When borders are breached, it sends a signal to all tyrants in the world that they can do the same. America leading that world order, paying a disproportionate share of the burden, I completely acknowledge that,

has led to a situation where the world has benefited from a very long period of peace. If you look at it historically, the number of people dying to war in the post-war period, and particularly since the end of the Cold War, is very low. And the whole world has had an uplift in prosperity that this species hasn't seen for 250,000 years. I don't want America, a country I hugely admire, to walk away from that. Doing a deal with Putin, you talked about peace, peers. You do a deal with Putin that does not have a security guarantee,

and we'll be back here in the same way that we're... I don't disagree. That is critical for American interests. Yeah, and I wouldn't trust Pugian personally, as far as I could throw him, frankly. I'm going to come to you, Scott, for an overview of all this in a moment. I'll hear you to listen, first of all. I've got a guest joining us, who's President Trump's senior advisor, Jason Miller. Jason, great to have you back on Uncensored.

It's a fascinating moment in history, this, where Donald Trump, as he's been sinkling he would before, during and after his election, has constantly railed against Europe for not divvying enough of the world. the responsibility both financially and militarily to defend itself. And he did this in his first term. That's why so many NATO countries ended up paying a lot more money, only as much as they were supposed to. That was down to Donald Trump.

And I feel like, I mean, you can correct me if I'm wrong, but it feels to me like this is a central tenet of his attitude now, which is why does America keep having to be the global policeman? Why, when there's a war erupting in Europe, is Europe not taking a lion's share of responsibility? Is that how you would categorise his overview position? The IRS is the biggest collection agency in the world, and with April the 15th now fast approaching,

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He said it at CPAC a week or so back, and he's also said it several other times that he really views his lasting legacy is being the peacemaker. Think about his first term when he brought about peace in the Middle East. Of course, we have the Abraham Accords. You look how he was able to help get to a ceasefire in the Middle East so far already just a matter. of days before he was sworn in. And he wants to stop the killing. And the issue, I think the broader issue when it comes to the Europeans in particular, is that nobody else is coming forward with a plan. There are a lot of people who have different ideas about what defines victory as far as which territory is kept, which territory is seated, what other concessions on either side might have to be

made. But the only person talking about stopping the killing is President Trump. And Peers, You referenced an important point or a conversation you had had with President Trump previously about the losses that Ukraine has suffered. But keep in mind, Ukraine is effectively going to have a lost generation from a couple of aspects. Number one, you have a total. It's over a million people who've either been killed or wounded. Now, that's including both sides during this war of the past three years. You have another 800,000 to a million women and children who've left Ukraine. And Pierce, they're never coming back, just to be clear on that.

If they've left Ukraine there not coming back, you look historically with Ukraine, what happened after World War I, World War II, even with the economic collapse after the fall of the Iron Curtain, you're going to have this lost generation. And if Zelensky does not take advantage of this opportunity now to stop the killing, Ukraine could be irreparably harmed. And that's what I think President Trump looks at and says, why are we being taken to the precipice of World War III? Why are we allowing this idiocy to continue hundreds of billions? of dollars, so many hundreds of thousands, if not millions of lives, we have to stop this. It's interesting to see the different reaction to what happened in the Oval Office. I mean, I think we can all agree it was pretty unedifying and probably shouldn't have been conducted in public that last 10 minutes in particular. But to your mind, what was the real catalyst for the flare up there? Because for 40 minutes or so, it was a pretty reasonable free-rolling encounter with the media where I was learning quite a lot, actually, about the various positions. and thought it was quite informative.

Then it all kicked off and became quite personal. What do you think it was that really enraged both President Trump and J.D. Vance into going after Zelensky? Well, I would say that it started even well before that. I think this is, again, this is from my perspective. I've certainly spoken with a number of people in the room, and that's the great thing about having this on television is that the transparency for everybody to see

exactly how this played out. But there was clearly an understanding from folks in the administration that Zelensky was going to sign up or show up that day and sign this economic agreement. And to make sure people understand what that is, that was something that Zelensky initially had actually suggested. It's something that would help lead for reconstruction efforts within Ukraine, also make sure that the U.S. was being paid back for its investment

and that there would be an economic cooperation going forward that would help with that reconstruction, also with the peace and stability. But it was very clear from the beginning when Zelensky showed out, that he did not want to get a peace deal done. That's why you saw some very tough comments earlier today from National Security Advisor Mike Walts, who said that until Zelensky says

that he wants to get this peace deal done, that it's not clear that he actually wants to move forward with anything. So for my perspective, from the second he got out of the truck, and he's wearing his bespoke track suit out of a complete disrespect. I mean, first of all, it's not even normal camo fatigues or whatever he has. It was a bespoke track suit. Who wears a track suit? to meet with the President of the United States.

I know he wore the same track suit. I guess he has multiple bespoke track suits. I don't know a couple days later with the King. But it was clear that he was not there to actually get a peace deal and to get an economic agreement done. Zolensky was there to blow the whole thing up. President Trump wants to get a peace deal done, but you've got to have Zolensky cooperating.

Okay. On the attire, I don't think it was an actual track suit. And what I would say is that there were plenty of pictures, as you know, of Winston Churchill. who never wore a suit to the White House during World War II when he went there. I don't think you were... Does it really matter that you've got a wartime leader who actually probably just for comfort, never mind anything else,

turns up it doesn't wear a suit for meetings? I mean, why do people care? Well, I think it matters a lot because, number one, this... It wasn't even Zelensky's normal... I know he kind of has his normal olive drab attire that he wears kind of the wartime look. But actually, if you go to him...

my X feed at Jason Miller. You'll see I posted a story this morning where they had commentary from, it was a especially designed and I say track suit. It looks like a track suit. I don't know, peers. You might have fancy a track suit. But it was literally But he was smarter than Elon Musk.

Here's what I would say. He was as smart or smarter than Elon Musk who conducts press conferences from the Oval Office wearing a t-shirt. So what's the difference? Well, a couple of things. Number one, Elon is not a leader of a country. Elon is someone who's being supportive.

He's someone who's a tech genius. He's not there to talk about world peace. He's talked there about how we can be more efficient with government operations and also government spending. But when you're showing up to get a peace deal and economic cooperation deal done, then you should at least show up in a respectful manner. And I think the fact that Vladimir Zelensky showed up in,

I know you disagree with my assessment, but to me it looks like a track suit, whether it's a designer track suit, whatever, just, and it wasn't even his normal, the kind of the camo or the olive drab fatigues, it did not look like Zelensky was serious, but it was also very clear as Zelensky started speaking with members of the administration that he was not serious about getting this deal done. President Trump, and I can, I say this over and over because I've spoken directly with the president, as I know you have, I know how the president view is his lasting legacy. I know how much he cares. Here's the important thing.

President Trump is the only person talking about stopping the killing. That's why I was quite frankly horrified, even some of our allies over the weekend. We're talking about getting back to deals and winners and losers, but the only person who says, I want to stop the killing is President Trump.

I think that really says something. It seems to me, we've reached a stage in this where President Zelensky is saying, look, I am hesitant to sign the minerals deal, which I think makes perfect sense, by the way. It's a really smart way of President Trump saying to his supporters, this is not going to cost us anything. I'm going to get the money back from the minerals

saying, I have an ongoing relationship. And unless I'm wrong, his position about the security backstop, if you like, is that if Ukraine is full of American contractors digging the minerals out of the ground, then Putin will not attack. Now, Zelensky's argument, which he tried to make, I think, in the room, and probably could have made it better if he hadn't been trying to speak English, his third language. But his argument, I think, was, well, it hasn't stopped Putin attacking, despite the fact, there are American businesses already in Ukraine and American companies and buildings and factories and so on. Why would it stop him by that logic from attacking if there were lots of mineral workers on the ground? What would you say to that? Well, I'd say a couple of things here.

And there's certain things that since I'm still involved with the president on the political side and with his confirmation efforts and not actually inside his national security team to be very clear on that, keep in mind, peers, that things that you and myself and other guests on your program are seeing, we don't see the entire picture necessarily. There's a lot more that's going on with regard to Ukraine, with Russia. We've seen all these other things, whether it be prisoner releases, all these things. Everything is interconnected towards trying to get to a peace deal and to stop the killing. The fact of the matter is, is that I think Zelensky is, I think, flexing a little bit too hard on what defines a win, what doesn't define a win when the president in his team, his administration,

and Marco Rubio and Mike Walts and Scott Besant. They're looking at the 360-degree picture here and saying, we have the strategy to do this. Now, if the United States is there involved in a major economic deal in a way, then, well, first of all, let me back up one second. As you correctly pointed out earlier, Putin invaded Ukraine under Obama.

He also did under Biden, but did not during the four years of President Trump. We get this deal done. The United States has an economic deal that's in place. That is going to go more to have. helping the stability and peace in the region than just about anything else. And so I also, I do think you make a really important point, peers, with regard to the language dynamic. And look, as someone who has a tough enough time with my first language frequently with English,

I understand how things can get lost in translation, literally and figuratively. And so I do give a lot of grace with that. And so things can be misunderstood or mischaracterized. But you could tell from everything from the body language, and even in the follow-up comments that President Zelensky has made since that meeting in the Oval Office, that he doesn't care about the disrespect that was shown at that moment. Someone clearly got to him and said, you need to tell the American people that you're appreciative for the hundreds of billions of dollars that have been spent in defense of their country so far. But what we need to see is that Zelensky is committed to getting to a real peace deal, to getting to a real economic deal.

The ball's in his court on this one. I know a mix of metaphors a bit, but President Trump, when he looked at President Zelensky in the eye and said, you don't hold the cards here. We all see what the trend lines look like. We see the number of people that Ukraine is losing on a weekly basis.

We see what's happening. Ukraine needs to get to a peace deal. The opportunity is there, but if Zelensky is not going to take it, that is bad for his country. It is bad for his people. And quite frankly, I think it's a damn shame for every additional person that dies unnecessarily.

Final question, Jason, I know you've got to go, but if you were talking directly to President Zelensky right now, what would you tell him to do to get back in the room at the White House with President Trump? Simple. President Trump doesn't play games. I would call up. I'm not sure if President Trump would even take his call directly, but I would call whoever President Zelensky is speaking with in the administration

and say, I want to get a peace deal done, I want to get an economic agreement with the United States done. I'm ready to sign it. If you want me to sign it in faxed at you or scan it in email, whatever the, however, carrier pigeon, however you want me to do it, I'm ready to do it now. I'm serious. No more games. I want to get this done.

I appreciate the fact, President Trump, that you're so committed to stop in the killing that's happening in Ukraine that you've spent so much time and effort to try to get to this. I want to be a good partner with you, with the United States. I'm sorry about what happened. in the Oval Office, but I want to stop the killing as well. Let's get these deals done and start moving ahead. It's real clear, real straightforward. And as you and I both know from our relationships with President Trump, he's a straight shooter. That's what he wants to hear. Jason Miller, great to have you back on Ancestead. Thank you very much. Thank you, sir.

Let's go back to the panel. Scott Horton, you've been listening patiently to all of this. What did you make, first of all, of what Jason Miller said there? Do you think that's an accurate characterization of where we are with this piece ever? Yeah, I think that's right. I'm not concerned about the close, but I think he was right that what caused the disagreement was Zelensky, you know, very publicly telegraphing that he does not support this deal. He essentially said, no, Russia still has to lose the war and leave Ukraine first. And then plus on top of that, he wants security guarantees from the United States.

I guess NATO membership in Article 5 protection before he's willing to go along. And that was when he was interrupting. And then he, I think this had to have been deliberate. He decided to call the vice president by his first name or by his initials he goes by there, J.D. And just said, come on, what negotiations. You can't negotiate with a guy who breaks all his promises, this and that. And as advanced put it, I'm surprised. I can't believe you're trying to litigate this here in this public setting in front of the media like this.

rather than in a private conversation. I think this had to have been deliberate that he essentially figured that he's not going to get anything from Trump, as your previous guest said, Trump has been bad-mounting Zelensky's so bad long before this. I think he already figured that he has no cards to play with Trump, so he might as well start his reelection campaign now if he's ever going to hold elections again

and do this PR stunt for his audience back home. But he very very, very much, but he very well may have completely sabotaged his relationship with the United States at this point. I would also like to add, and I don't hear anybody hardly ever say this, that we shouldn't be doing this mineral deal at all. I mean, first of all, there are hardly any rare earth minerals in Ukraine in the first place. There was a great piece in Bloomberg news about that, how this is completely a misnomer anyway.

But secondly, as Marco Rubio, the Secretary of State and President Trump both said, and as you were just discussing with his guy Miller there, that this is some sort of half-assed war guarantee, a security guarantee that if we put Americans on the ground there, this will be some kind of tripwire for war like our troops in Korea,

and so therefore Russia will never try that. But we don't want that any more than we want to give them membership in NATO and Article 5. This is essentially none of America's business at all. We need to get out of there. If the American people need to be paid back for the war, then I suggest

they start with seizing the bank accounts of the Biden family and the Kagan family, and maybe we just leave it at that. Maybe Doge can save us the rest of the $200 billion firing government employees that we don't need. But we need to wash our hands of this. If you go back to the end of the Second World War and the creation of NATO, the argument at the time was that, of course, if this was just imperial Russia dominating Eastern Europe, we wouldn't care. But this is communism.

This is Joseph Stalin and the global totalitarian revolution. We have to draw the line at the Elbe River. We can't let them go any further west than that. But those days are long gone. Security for Europe is Europe's problem. America first doesn't mean like George W. Bush be selfish and belligerent and knock people down and take their stuff. It means defend America first.

Enough of the empire. Renounce our role as global policemen and all of this stuff and just come home. And you notice, Pierce, the hawk on this panel said the same thing that Biden says, the same thing that all of these dorks say. They either say it's Churchill and Hitler or it's the bully on the playground. And you notice it's never the star of the baseball team who actually beat up the bully on the playground.

It's always the pencil neck dork with the four eyes who needed to be saved from the bully over and over again, who invokes these analogies. And yet, do they ever explain what they're talking about? What support is America supposed to give Ukraine that's going to bloody Putin's nose and force the Russians out? We all know what we take. Okay, look, we've just had the alleged dork come up as you were saying that, Matthew side. Let's get you quick to respond, Matthew. I mean, I thought it was very well laid out earlier that if you look at the relative sides of Europe collectively compared to Russia, compared to the United States,

Actually, what you saw this weekend, potentially, was the European Union plus the UK, who left the EU, but are now seemingly leading this, saying, all right, well, we're going to step up here. All we want from the United States is to be a backstop, that there is a cover if the shooting starts, but we will actually do the heavy lifting of troops on the ground and the rest of it. And that America may have a kind of behind-the-scenes backstop role. I mean, Matthew, you know, I could see that eventuality happening. Well, the reason... Well, how do you face the charge of being a dog, first of all? Well, I accept it. I am a bit of a d'aunt.

If that means geek, I don't mind that as an insult. But I do think it's worth saying that the reason why Trump's aspiration of bringing the world to peace has a contradictory element is to the extent that we allow Putin to benefit from the invasion, to bank land, to get his hand on some of the mineral wealth, not raw, as Trump calls it, rare earth metals, but the other deposits that do have a market value, is it will incentivise others to invade borders. We live in a globally interconnected world, the last contributor. There are intricate supply chains, which America relies on, not just of minerals, but many other things, too. People don't seem to understand the level of global cooperation

beneath the surface of our consciousness, internet domain names, all sorts of things. When that starts to break down, it will affect Americans. I agree that Europe needs to pull its way. At the moment, it is not capable of deter and Putin. If there was a guarantee only provided by Europe,

it would be not worth the paper it was written on. I agree with you. Europe needs to spend up. I argued this weekend for 5% expenditure on defence. Like Poland has. 4.1% Poland at the moment. And a proportionate decrease in all other areas of the budget because I want to draw America in

to the argument that I think is fundamental. Americans have benefited from the global rules-based order. Yes, they've been ripped off to an extent. But if that disappears, and that last contributor, we don't care about Europe living under totalitarian rule, that isn't good for Europeans. That's not a morally uplifting proposition that's being, but it's bad for Americans too.

That's the argument. All right, Tara. Even if it's dorkish. Yeah, Tarah, what do you think is the most achievement? achievable outcome here. Because my take on it, for what it's worth, is that it is highly likely if they get to a peace deal, that there will be a freezing along current territorial lines. There won't be a granting of sovereignty to Russia over the 20% of Ukraine they've taken,

but they will be able to retain their occupation, for one of the better phrase, that Europe, led by the UK and France and Germany and others, will put troops on the ground as peacekeepers along that border, that America will do the minerals deal. I think it's more likely than not, notwithstanding the fact that the Scots says it doesn't really mean anything. Even more reason in that case

for Ukraine to do it, frankly. It's only cost some loads of money, then why not? I can see that that being the scenario which we could end up with in a few weeks. What do you think? I think what President Trump is thinking about right now is the fact that the war in Ukraine is very unpopular with Americans.

They hear price tags like 50 billion. in the budget for Ukraine. And it just does not sell, really, on both sides of the aisle. I think they just want the war to end. And they probably at home are not thinking about the nitty-gritty of how much, you know, land does Vladimir Putin end up winning. The minerals deal is kind of a smoke and mirrors thing that I think Donald Trump did to sell to his base.

Like, listen, if we give them more money, well, at least we're making something off there, right? We have a minerals deal. Well, minerals are dirty. They're probably all under a bunch of Russian tanks in the eastern part of the country. They may not be as valuable as they sound. But if it's a deal and it's something that makes Americans money when all they're hearing all every day is about the debt that we're in, the fact that we need a doge operation to slash through federal spending, you know, people are

losing their jobs because of it. And it's not just Democrats in Washington. It's people that, you know, work in the forestry and everything around the country. They want to at least hear, okay, we're getting something for our involvement in Ukraine. I don't think when you're selling it at home, the specifics really matter, right? But at the same time, Zelensky is pulling on the American heartstrings. He's been doing that for many years, and his message is incredibly, you know, compelling. Images of war, women, children fleeing their homes that worked for America for a long time. It was Slavia, Ukraine, from both sides of the aisle.

I don't know how salient that is right now, but I just don't think Americans are going to care about the details, and they are going to like the narrative that the Europeans have stepped. up and become more involved in this because it just makes common sense. Yeah, I mean, it's interesting. Why haven't they been contributing? Well, I think I think it's been shameful. It's been a complete dereliction of duty by successive European governments, including our own.

And thank God, our Prime Minister now is finally stepping up and we're significantly increasing, but I think we should go a lot higher. Clay, it was interesting. Let me, uh, yeah, sorry. Can I jump in? I want to apologize to your other guests there for the insult. I shouldn't have said that, but my point was, is that all we ever hear is, these analogies about the playground.

We don't ever hear anyone explain how this is supposed to work that America and or Europe reverse Russia's gains on the ground. We can't without sending in the 82nd Airborne in the U.S. Navy. I do think that's a very salient point because most military people I've talked to

at any level have all agreed. I'll come to you, Clay, now. They've all agreed that Ukraine cannot win this war and it cannot now kick Russia out of the 20% that it's currently occupying. It is a stalemate that's been like this for eight, nine months. All what's happening is that thousands of people are dying on a daily basis. And the carnage, as Trump says, has to stop. I mean, the more worrying thing for me about the geopolitical aspect of this, Clay,

is Jason Miller said that, you know, Elon Musk doesn't get involved in the war stuff. Well, actually, he did at the weekend. You know, he responded to someone on Twitter, on X, his own platform, in which he said, yes, when this person suggested America should pull out, not just the United Nations, but also out of NATO. Now, America pulling out of NATO would be, in my opinion, a catastrophic development in all this. NATO is what stands collectively between, I would say, the world eventually stumbling into nuclear war and not. What do you feel about that? So several things. One CNN poll over the weekend, building on what Tara said,

78% of Americans want a ceasefire. I think she's right where the squiggly line is drawn. The average American, I'm not sure, could put Ukraine on a map if the other countries weren't labeled around it. They're not going to get involved in the nitty gritty over where that line is drawn. Second part, and I think this is really important, and it kind of tied in with your discussion with Jason Miller. It's not only that Trump wants peace. It's what does Zelensky want? I think Zelensky, because of all the leadership. Pierce, you saw everybody line up and send their message about how they supported him after the Oval

Office meeting. He sees himself as Winston Churchill. You're British. Can you imagine if you saw yourself as the modern day version of Winston Churchill and then the end of your Churchillian lore was you allowed 20% of Ukraine

to go over to the bad guys. That destroys his entire worldview of how he sees himself. And I think that's why in the Oval Office need he doesn't want peace. Okay, but let me pick you off. I think Trump read this correctly. Hang on. Hang on a second because actually, interestingly, yesterday I was reading a very

interesting piece about why at the end of World War II, Churchill acquiesced when Russia decided to keep Poland at the time, right, which was incredibly controversial. And Churchill did just accept that this was one of the prices that had to be paid for bringing the whole thing to an end. So, you know, in a way I do see a bit of a parallel there. you've got to make very hard decisions. And I also think that Zelensky... I think the Zelensky...

Well, the Churchill parallel goes further. I think that, you know, I was in Kiev four months after the war started. I said to him, you do remind me of Churchill and the way that you rallied your people almost single-handedly in those first few days and weeks when everyone just assumed Russia would steam through and take Kiev, and that would be it.

So I think there are legitimate parallels there. But I think the idea that this leads to America leaving waiter... Well, and the concern peers also for Zelensky probably is Churchill got voted out, even after he stood up to Hitler, you know, on the historical analogy. Let me hit you with one other thing. I don't agree with leaving NATO. I don't agree. I think Elon Musk sometimes throws things out.

The other guests have made an important point. I think this is significant, too. We are historically illiterate in the United States, but I think much of the world is also historically illiterate. The only analogy people seem to be able to draw to, anything in history is Hitler and World War II. Everything is analogized to that. Where I would point to on this, and I think it's significant, is Russia does not have the ability to roll through other countries. That was the argument that was made early on. Well, if they take Ukraine, up next, Poland,

this is going to be just like Hitler and World War II. No, it isn't. To your point, there's way more opposition lined up. We have to have a peace and a ceasefire here. But the idea that Putin is in some way, modern-day version of Adolf Hitler, or that Trump is a modern-day version of Adolf Hitler, right? We've created this world where anytime someone disagrees with you, well, they're a modern-day version of Hitler, it's historically illiterate and, frankly, it's insulting to anyone who has actually got a scintilla of a brain and has ever studied world history. Frankly, nothing going on in the world today is remotely similar to what happened 80 years ago in World War II. No, I would agree with that.

Scott, there's a statement from Donald Trump because there was a headline AP News. Ukraine Zelensky says, end of war with Russia, is quotes very, very far away. And Trump has responded to this, copying in the headline. I'm saying this is the worst statement that could have been made by Zelensky. America will not put up with it for much longer.

It's what I was saying. This guy doesn't want there to be peace as long as he has America's backing. And Europe in the meeting they had with Zelensky stated flatly that they cannot do the job without the United States. Probably not a great statement to be made in terms of a show of strength against Russia. What are they thinking?

It does seem to me, Scott, it's all coming to a head here. I don't think it's a coincidence that Elon Musk floats the idea that America leaves NATO. He was with Trump all weekend at Murillago. He flew with him back on Air Force One to the White House. These things are not happening in isolation from each other. I think there's a genuine risk here that this could really fracture long-held relationships

since the end of World War II between the United States and Europe, including potentially a movement to try and get out of NATO, which I never thought we'd see that day come, but you can see the language that's being used now. This is ratcheting up. What do you think? I think that would be the greatest thing

that we could possibly do for American foreign policy would be to leave the NATO alliance. We should have completely abolished NATO when the Soviet Union and the Warsaw Pact fell apart in 1989 through 1991. And if you, well, and by the way, Pierce, the book is in the mail on its way to you right now. Right. And enjoy seeing all the debate about that from back during that time and how all the expanders themselves even said that the purpose of this is to keep Germany down

and Russia out in America, the dominant force in Europe, and to prevent Germany and Britain and France from just creating their own EU army and guaranteeing their own security, which they could have done. The hawk on the panel agreed and lamented America picking up the cost for European security this whole time. Well, here, here, only times 1,000 as an American.

This kind of stuff is absolutely none of our business. And I did not say, as he must have misunderstood me, that it would have been fine to just abandon Europe to totalitarianism, I'm saying the argument after World War II was about Joseph Stalin and the Soviet Union and the totalitarian terror state and world revolution. That was the Cold War against communism. That's long over. Vladimir Putin may be a strong man and an autocrat of sorts,

but Russia is not a totalitarian state, right? It's essentially a center-right conservative Christian government, just like the kind we have here. And so if it did, in fact, come to do, dominate Estonia again. So what? We're not talking about the Soviet Union. And it absolutely is not worth trading American cities and American lives. And in a real war with Russia, we're talking about by the millions and hundreds of millions in order to protect cities in countries that Americans have never even heard of. Try to find an American who can name you a single city in Latvia,

Lithuania or Estonia and tell them that, yeah, but that's okay because your government is signed up to trade your hometown for theirs in the event of a conflict with Russia. Let Germany and Poland and France and England deal with their own problems, put America first. Okay, Matthew, yeah, Matthew. You know what, though? Hang on, Tara. I'll come to you after Matthew. I don't know how often you have been to Russia. I've been there very often. The idea that is a right-of-center conservative government similar to what you have in the United States is the most risible assertion I think I've ever heard on television.

And I've heard a lot of them. That is a ridiculous. If I may say so, and if I may just respond to what you said, I think that is ridiculous. There is not a free press. You look at what is happening in Ukraine where they have kidnapped children.

Women have been raped. I said it wasn't totalitarian communism. I thought you compared it to a center-right. We can look back at the tape. But either way, I agree with you. in the United States, too. If I may just finish the point, I agree with you completely that we don't want to escalate to global thermonuclear war.

NATO is not just an alliance based on the military. It is a psychological construct. People need to be aware that if they breach the Article 5 guarantee, it will lead to escalation. That is what deters nuclear war. And by permitting, but if I can just finish the point, by permitting Putin to gain a benefit. from a war of aggression, from a war of conquest. It sends a signal to all other people who wish to do the same, that they may do so.

You keep saying we're allowing it. How are you going to disallow it without sending in the American army and navy? Well, that is a very good question. I mean, Matthew, before I go to Tara, Matthew, on that point, a lot of people echo your sentiments here, but don't have a sensible, logical, workable way that we stop Putin otherwise. I mean, without American forces engaging directly with Russian forces, what do we do? So as I said earlier, when anybody aggresses in the way that Putin has done,

it shouldn't have happened. If after Crimea, there'd have been a more robust response. Now that it has, what do we do? But now that it has, this is the basic equation. The aggressor needs to pay a price higher than the benefit that they accrue in order to send a signal to them in the future and to all other aggressor. they must not do so because it will not be in their interest. That's why I think the conduct of this war has been mistaken. I would like to have gone harder earlier. I think that if we don't do that, it is more likely that Putin will go again.

The previous contributor said he doesn't want to go further. He has said explicitly he wants the Baltic states. He wants to create the greater Russian Empire. I have no doubt that that is his aspiration. I have no doubt that Xi Jinping wants to create a sphere of influence take over Taiwan. Unless there is a willingness to hold the line. That's the realism that we need in the world today. And that's better.

By the way, I agree that Europe has free-ridden. I want us to step up. But that alliance between Europe and the United States has been a tremendous force for the good of both of our communities and the wider world. Let me, hang on, let me bring in Tara. I've been waiting patiently. Hang on, Scott.

Tara to respond. I was going to make that point that I've traveled all over the country, I mean, all over the world. I've been to Afghanistan. I've been to Italy. I've traveled and seen the NATO bases and our troops and our foreign allies who are now, you know,

a lot of the NATO troops at our U.S. bases are not American. They're Polish. They're, you know, they're British. They're French. When we went into Afghanistan and Iraq, you know, who is there with us? We're going to lose those allies in the future.

And America will be by itself. And I think that we have to think about that in the broader... Okay. Scott, before you respond, I know, Clay, you've got to... to leave us. Do you want to just very quickly say what you wanted to say? And then, and then, and then go? Yeah, I was just responding.

Vladimir Putin may have aspirations of returning the Russian Empire and going back and taking other assets. I don't believe he has the functional ability to do it. So I think this analogy of, oh, if we don't stop him now, we did, right? He's going to get parts of Ukraine. There is going to be a solution. A ceasefire is coming. How do you prevent him from going? in again, I would suggest he's not going to do it against Trump because he fears how Trump might respond. My concern is who gets elected in 2029 because I don't think it's coincidental that he saw the weakness in Joe Biden and invaded when he did. I appreciate you guys. I got a radio show to go get to. Great to have you. I love the arguments. And Pierce, appreciate you having me on.

Great to have you as always. Thank you very much, Clay. Scott, just on that point, I mean, I do think that is the genuine concern that Zelensky has, which he was trying to articulate and probably, again, because of a language thing, he couldn't get it out quite the way I think he intended. But I interviewed him at length two weeks ago for 90 minutes. And there's no doubt the biggest concern he has is deterring Putin from coming back for more of Ukraine. And he wants enough security guarantees,

be it from Europe, America, preferably both, I think, is how he sees this, where it is a genuine deterrent. And that's where Europe seems to have got the memo from Trump. If you lead, then we may be prepared to do some kind of backstop support as well. Do you not think that would work? No, I mean, look, I respect the fact that Zelensky is in a very tough position. He helped to get himself in this very tough position. But the answer is tough.

A European war guarantee to what's left of Ukraine, backstop by the United States means that your bluff holds until it doesn't. And if it fails, then we go to war. with the Russian Federation over who controls deeper Nostka's flop-flop, the oblast between the river and Donetsk, that even a lot of Ukrainians can't figure out how to pronounce. It doesn't matter to American security. And, you know, Robert Kagan, who is one of the principal intellectual authors

of the entire doctrine of what he calls benevolent global hegemony, the co-founder of the Project for New American Century, one of the architects of Iraq War II, and the husband of Victoria Newland. He recently wrote that, you know what? Comes down to it, Ukraine actually doesn't matter to the United States of America at all. For the whole time that the Soviet Union occupied Ukraine

during the Cold War, it didn't make a difference whatsoever. Who controls the northern coast of the Black Sea is not part of America's interest. Kagan called the Cold War the good old days. I absolutely dispute that as an avowed enemy of communism. That's not right that it was the good old days, But he is right that it actually does not matter if Ukraine were to become, again, the Ukraine, a region of Russia, like it had been for hundreds of years, most of it anyway. It does not truly matter. It would be sad, but it doesn't affect American national security.

And Zelensky's a fool for not taking the opportunity to quit while he's only so far behind because no one is going to help him drive Russia out. And he can't do it himself. The question now is whether he's going to also lose. Harkiv and Odessa or whether he's not. And if he could get Trump to get Putin to agree to draw the line here, that would be the best case for him. Now whether Putin would, you know, arm up and reinvade later, I sincerely doubt. I think you guys assume the premise here

that all Putin really wants to do is rebuild the Russian Empire, but that's really not true. What actually happened here was America. He's literally supposedly said that. No, actually, what he said was that anyone who doesn't lament the fall of the Soviet Union has no heart, and anyone who wants it back has no brain. That's the rest of the sentence that they always omit. In fact, the basis of the speech was actually about how he had already saved Russia and fixed everything from how down and bad things used to be.

Okay. And so it was in no way declaring a doctrine of recreating the Russian Empire in the Baltics and Lithuania and so forth. It's just not true. We've got to leave it there. It's been a fascinating debate. Thank you all very much. And Tara, thanks for coming on for the first time. Come back again.

We appreciate it. Thank you very much. Yeah, thank you. Pierce Morgan Unsensit is proudly independent. The only boss around here is me. If you enjoy our show, we ask only one simple thing. Hit subscribe on YouTube and follow Pierce Morgan Unsensit on Spotify and Apple Podcast. And in return, we will continue our mission to inform, irritate, and entertain.

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