Background Briefing: April 24, 2025
Why Should Putin Accept Trump’s Peace Deal When He Can Wait for Him to Walk Away as Promised?
We begin with Trump feigning indignation at Putin’s murderous missile attack on Kyiv while he throws Ukraine under the bus, trying to force a surrender on the victim while rewarding the aggressor. We discuss the opposite of the “art of the deal” as Trump gives Putin an incentive not to make a deal but to wait for him to walk away and abandon Ukraine as he has threatened to do. Joining us is Jacob Heilbrunn, the Editor at the National Interest and a non-resident senior fellow at The Atlantic Council’s Eurasia Center and a columnist for The Spectator. His books include They Knew They Were Right: The Rise of the Neocons and America Last: The Right’s Century-Long Romance with Foreign Dictators. We discuss his article at The National Interest, “Is Trump About to Abandon Ukraine? Why agree to a deal when Trump may simply abandon Ukraine.”
One-By-One News Organizations are Caving to Trump’s Extortion
Then we look into how major news organizations are caving to Trump’s extortion as the wannabe dictator follows the playbook of Putin, Orban and Erdogan to turn the free press into a chorus of worship for the “dear leader” following the example of the ritual praise Trump gets from his cabinet. Joining us is Jameel Jaffer, a Professor of Law and Journalism and the inaugural director of the Knight First Amendment Institute at Columbia University. A former deputy legal director of the American Civil Liberties Union, he has argued human rights and civil liberties cases in multiple appeals courts as well as the U.S. Supreme Court, and has testified many times before the U.S. Congress. We discuss his op-ed at The Guardian, “The Trump administration’s roundup of student protesters is genuinely shocking,” and his oped at The New York Times, “This Is Not a Moment to Settle With Trump”
Inside Project 2025 and the Right Wing Zealots and Culture Warriors Who Crafted the Roadmap For Trump
Then finally we speak with David Graham, a staff writer at The Atlantic, where he covers politics and national affairs. He won the Toner Prize for Excellence in National Political Reporting for his coverage of the 2020 presidential election. His new book, just out, is The Project: How Project 2025 Is Reshaping America and we explore how much Trump is following the roadmap the right wing zealots and culture warriors at the Heritage Foundation laid out for him and his administration.