The MeidasTouch Podcast - Senator Adam Schiff Responds to Trump’s Oval Office Meltdown

Episode Date: March 1, 2025

MeidasTouch host Ben Meiselas interviews Democratic Senator Adam Schiff on Trump’s despicable meeting with Zelenskyy. For more, visit MeidasPlus.com Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

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please contact Connex Ontario at 1-866-531-2600 to speak to an advisor free of charge. BetMGM operates pursuant to an operating agreement with iGaming Ontario. I'm joined by Senator Adam Schiff. Senator, I want to get your reaction to that travesty in the Oval Office today where Donald Trump was attacking Ukrainian President Zelensky in the Oval Office with J.D. Vance laundering talking points, seems directly from the Kremlin. You had President Zelensky, in my view, kind of holding his ground, defending his country and frankly, all democracies. I want to get your reaction to what you observed. I was horrified and sickened by it. I think about

what other generations of Americans have done going off to war in World War II, fighting for our freedom, fighting for democracy, fighting for our values, to see them so utterly betrayed in this meeting, it is just really incomprehensible to have the President of the United States and the Vice President of the United States siding with the Kremlin dictator, regurgitating his talking points, a country that brutally invaded its neighbor, that has massacred tens of thousands of people, that has kidnapped children, that is torturing POWs. That's the guy they're defending. And they're abusing the president of Ukraine, Zelensky, who was forced to defend himself, defend his country, and all in the service of what exactly?

The mineral rights? Is that what this is about? That President Trump is upset he didn't get the mineral rights to Ukraine? Are we that transactional? Does nothing matter to us but some kind of protection racket? Or I don't know what, but whether this was a deliberate sabotage,

an orchestrated sabotage, or whether a small know what, but whether this was a deliberate sabotage, an orchestrated sabotage, or whether a small, petty, weak president, Donald Trump, was just offended that the president of Ukraine stood up for his country, I don't know. But we are going to be living with the consequences of this for a very long time. Your colleague, Senator Lindsey Graham, a Republican, he spoke after the meeting and he said that he thinks that after that Moscow will be more afraid than ever. Let me show you what Senator Graham had to say and I'll get your reaction to it. Take away, I told President Trump, I said, there's two ways to look at this. Your interaction with Zelensky was maybe the best television I've ever seen, but it's

steeper than that. The world is now watching how Trump behaves and acts when he's pressed. I thought he stood up for America, that we're a good people. We want to help you, but we're going to be respected. So I think Moscow is probably more afraid of Trump than ever. Hope the Chinese are, and I hope the Iranians are. As to Zelensky and Ukraine, to the Ukrainian people, America wants to help you. The way the meeting went today, you made it almost impossible to help you. Senator Schiff, do you think Moscow is more afraid than ever after what they observed in the Oval Office earlier today with Trump and Zelensky. I can't imagine a better meeting from the point of view of Vladimir Putin.

He has to be just overjoyed with this. Watching the president of the United States betray Ukraine, watching the president of the United States call Ukraine the aggressor, make out Zelensky to be a dictator. Literally, they must be celebrating in the Kremlin. This has been such a dramatic transformation of American policy. So I don't know what meeting my colleague was watching, but it could not have been the same meeting that the rest of America and the world were watching. This is a dream come true for the Kremlin, but for our allies, and I think you can see the reaction of our allies, world leaders in Europe and elsewhere, all coming to the defense

of Ukraine. They witnessed the same meeting and they're all expressing support for Ukraine. And why? Because they witnessed the president of the United States betray Ukraine. So I don't think there's any question about what the mood is in Moscow. It's just jubilant. But everywhere else, it's a cataclysm. And frankly, if the president of the United States won't defend our values, won't defend democracy, won't stand by our allies, then we damn well need to do it in Congress. And I hope that what we heard from one of my colleagues is very much an

outlier. Because if it isn't, I don't know what happened to the party of Ronald Reagan. Ronald Reagan must be rolling over at his grave right now. So what do you think is the reaction that's going to be? I'm not sure if you've heard anything from some of your colleagues, perhaps on the other side of the aisle yet. That's what Lindsey Graham had to say. There was, you know, tended to be bipartisan support for by and large. I mean, I would say there were a lot of Republicans in the House who weren't supportive of Ukraine. But in the Senate, there was more bipartisan support of Ukraine and Zelensky.

What are you hearing now? Are Republicans so afraid of Trump that they're afraid of his tweets and Elon Musk posting things on X and Doge? I mean, what's going on? I went to the Munich Security Conference, which was only a week or 10 days ago, and it was a bipartisan delegation. We sat down and met with Zelensky. During those meetings, I expressed my strong support for Ukraine. I took issue with what Secretary Hegseth had then said about, well, Ukraine won't be a member of NATO and they're not going to be able to retain the territory that Russia has invaded, and said that, no, Ukraine and NATO should decide who's in NATO. Nobody gets a veto. The Kremlin certainly doesn't get a veto. And what's more, we shouldn't be undercutting Ukraine

in terms of its territory, even before negotiation begins. And those remarks I made were not an outlier. I think they were very much consistent on a bipartisan basis with what other senators in the room also felt. Now, whether they'll speak out, some have spoken out before today, whether they'll speak out after today when they cannot avoid a direct confrontation with the president remains to be seen. But if not now, when, if not after such a fundamental betrayal, then indeed their support for Ukraine, for our international standing has simply vanished, disappeared along with Donald Trump's arrival on the scene. So after that Oval Office meeting, Donald Trump canceled a press conference that was supposed to happen and then announced that he posted on his social

media platform that he was also just canceling the peace talks. I mean, it feels like what a petulant child would do in a situation like that. Then he went outside of the White House and he was wearing the like the red MAGA hat. And he was basically asked by the press. So what would Zelensky, what should Zelensky have done in the Oval Office? And Trump is like, well, he shouldn't have stood there and been like, Putin's bad, Putin this, Putin that. Like, why was he talking about like Putin that way? I mean, here, you could hear for yourself what Trump said. I'll get your reaction to it. Let's play. He's got to say, I want to make peace. He doesn't have to stand there and say about Putin this, Putin that, all negative things. He's got to say, I want to make peace.

I don't want to fight a war any longer. His people are dying. Trump's saying he doesn't have to say negative things, Putin this, Putin that. I mean, I'm watching that and I'm thinking to myself, like, this is crazy. This is crazy stuff. It is crazy stuff. And it's a continuation of what we heard from President Trump yesterday when he was talking about how we can rely on Putin. And Putin seems to be a man of his word. This is the guy who puts polonium in your tea and kills you. This is a guy who has murdered journalists and thrown,

not personally, but had top Russian military and other leaders who disagree with him or aren't sufficiently pro-Putin thrown out of windows, or has their plane crashed, as we saw with Prokosian. This is the guy that we're going to certainly trust him. And he's taking issue with Zelensky for his criticism of Putin. We used to have presidents of the United States until this one who would share that criticism of the Kremlin dictator. But look, this is Donald Trump being petulant Donald Trump. This is Donald Trump caring about nothing of American values. It's just about his ego or trying to make a buck or aggrandize himself. If he truly believed in the peace

negotiations, would he be willing to walk away from them on, you know, with such a huff? You know, it's all about Donald Trump. And today, Donald Trump wasn't pleased with a leader who stood up for himself and stood up for his country and wasn't going to be a lickspittle. But you can see the reaction around the world. And it has not isolated Zelensky. It has isolated Donald Trump and, sadly, the United States of America along with him. Well, Senator, this week as well, Donald Trump said he would be selling Trump gold cards for $5 million a pop to Russian oligarchs. He said, yes, Russian Trump said he would be selling Trump gold cards for $5 million a pop

to Russian oligarchs. He said, yes, Russian oligarchs, they could buy into the United States if they wanted to be citizens. They didn't have to buy a Trump gold card. I won't get into that. I've covered that before. Just a final question, which is, it's obviously a dark day, a day that's going to live in infamy in American history, world history, and especially in Ukraine. So first, as a senator from California, you know, as someone who is a leader in the United States Senate, generally in our body politic right now, what do you want to say to the people of America right now? And then what do you want to say to the people of Ukraine and the world? Well, to the people of America, I want to just say this is not who we are. This is not who we are.

We don't bully an ally. We don't take the side of a dictator. We don't ignore the long and important role that we have played in defending democracy. That is not who we are. We're just not what we saw displayed by the President of the United States today. And I think we all have a role to play right now in the defense, not just of Ukraine, but of what the country stands for, of our values. I would say to our allies around the world, what they witness to might be Donald Trump, but it is not America.

And we'll have to get through this period. We'll have to struggle through this period. We'll have to be more reliant. When I say we, the freedom-loving people of the world are going to have to be more reliant on other leaders in the world because we cannot rely on this president. And it's a terrible way to feel about a president of the United States, but the shameful display we had today is so antithetical to everything that our country has stood for, and I hope it is never repeated. Senator Adam Schiff, thank you for joining us this evening. Thank you. Everybody hit subscribe.

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