With explosions rocking Kyiv after Russian President Vladimir Putin ordered a “special military operation” against Ukraine, former President Donald Trump ran to Fox News on Wednesday night and blamed the violent and unprovoked Russian invasion of a sovereign nation on a “rigged election.”
Calling into Trump loyalist Laura Ingraham’s primetime program, the twice-impeached ex-president immediately asserted that none of this would be happening if he were still occupying the White House. At the same time, he also heaped praise on Putin—a years-long habit he hasn’t broken in recent days.
“It’s a terrible thing. The way it started, I don’t believe he wanted to do this initially,” Trump declared. “I think he wanted to do something and negotiate it and it got worse and worse. He saw the weakness—when it really started with the weakness in Afghanistan. The way they pulled out of Afghanistan. I really believe that’s where he started to think he could do this.”
ADVERTISEMENT
After Ingraham said that she understood President Joe Biden was monitoring the situation in Ukraine, Trump said he didn’t believe it and that Biden was “sleeping” instead. He then went back to describing the “good relationship” he has with Putin before airing a laundry list of personal grievances.
“It was hurt by the Russia hoax. You see what happened with Durham and those reports and other reports including Mueller. It was a made-up hoax and it hurt our country,” he groused, referencing Fox News’ hyperbolic reporting about Special Counsel John Durham’s recent report.
Turning back to the situation in Ukraine, Ingraham wondered if Putin was looking to just take over all of Ukraine and what it would do to the NATO alliance, blaming American “weakness” in the process.
“I think that’s what happened,” Trump grumbled. “He was gonna be satisfied with the peace. And now he sees the weakness and incompetence and stupidity of this administration.” The former president, who was impeached a year ago for inciting a violent insurrection over false claims of election fraud, once again circled back to his “Big Lie” obsession.
“As an American, I am angry about it and I’m saddened by it,” Trump said. “And it all happened because of a rigged election! This would have never happened!”
He added: “That includes inflation and that includes millions of people pouring in on a monthly basis, far more than three million, and they are coming from 129 different countries. They are destroying our country!”
Ingraham, meanwhile, quickly cut off the ex-president in order to carry a live speech from the Ukrainian envoy at the United Nations Security Council meeting. However, unlike other cable news channels, she ended up dumping out of the speech so she could continue her chat with Trump.
Turning back to Trump for reaction, the Fox News host called the Ukrainian ambassador a “defeated man” while simultaneously swiping at Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky for imploring Putin not to attack his country, describing it as a “pathetic display.”
Trump, however, somehow thought Ingraham had reported about “the amphibious attacks by Americans” in Ukraine and that she was giving out classified information.
“You shouldn’t be saying that because you and everybody else shouldn't know about it,” a startled Trump blared. “They should do that secretly and not be doing that through the great Laura Ingraham. They should be doing that secretly!”
Ingraham, in the end, reassured Trump that she wasn't talking about U.S. forces but rather the Russian military in Ukraine, prompting the former president to casually conclude that American military action “will be next.”
