“I’ve had the privilege of meeting a lot of foreign leaders. They’re laughing behind his back,” he said at Politico’s California summit. “Do not conflate what I just said with the meeting I had with the Denmark delegation [California and Denmark just made a comprehensive agreement on climate and tech]. I’ve had dozens and dozens, ambassadors [who] met with him. They’re laughing behind his back. He’s being played everywhere. It’s an embarrassment.”
https://www.buzzfeed.com/mjs538/gavin-newsom-on-people-talking-about-trump
Following a historic gathering at the White House, where President Donald Trump and Ukraine’s Volodymyr Zelenskyy met with seven European leaders in an unprecedented show of solidarity, Trump suffered a significant setback.
CNN broke into regular broadcasting with urgent news, revealing that the US President is under enormous pressure as major hurdles emerge in his bid to bring the Ukraine war to an end. Reporter Kimberly Dozier observed, “The fact that he feels he’s got to check in with Putin right away and… we get news that Putin is saying, ‘By the way, no NATO troops on the ground in Ukraine. That is unacceptable,’ still feels like Trump needs Putin’s approval.”
This development followed reports that Trump had stepped out of discussions with European leaders to place a call to the Russian president. This came just days after a lip reader revealed the chilling 3-word promise (“I’ll help you.”) that Trump whispered into Putin’s ear at their Alaska summit.
The demonstration of backing for Zelenskyy included French President Emmanuel Macron, Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni, British Prime Minister Keir Starmer, Finnish President Alexander Stubb, German Chancellor Friedrich Merz, NATO Secretary General Mark Rutte and European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen, reports the Express.
After the phone conversation, the Kremlin dismissed speculation about a potential meeting between Putin and Zelenskyy, even as Trump continued pushing for the two leaders to hold a summit aimed at resolving the Ukraine conflict. The US leader confessed that the conflict was “a tough one” to resolve, stating, “We’re going to find out about President Putin in the next couple of weeks. It’s possible that he doesn’t want to make a deal.”
On Monday, Putin expressed to Trump that he was “open” to direct talks with Ukraine. However, Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov diluted this already vague commitment the following day, suggesting that a meeting would need to be prepared “gradually… starting with the expert level and thereafter going through all the required steps.”
Meanwhile, Dmitry Polyanskiy, a Russian deputy representative to the UN, told the BBC that “Nobody [had] rejected” the chance for direct talks, but it shouldn’t just be a “but it shouldn’t be a meeting for the sake of a meeting.”
Kimberly, speaking on CNN, added, “It’s got to be very disturbing to Zelensky sitting there, but of course Zelensky was a good actor he’s playing it cool, he’s not biting on any of the questions he got.
“Hopefully, what’s going to happen is they’re going to go into this meeting with European officials and the Europeans are saying ‘We need to put these troops on the ground inside Ukraine and it’s not Vladimir Putin’s business.”
On Wednesday, representatives from 30 different countries will gather at the Pentagon for meetings aimed at finalizing what each nation is willing to commit to Ukraine’s national security.
This includes Tony Radakin, the chief of the defense staff and leader of the British armed forces. He is anticipated to inform his American counterparts that the UK is ready to deploy troops to defend Ukraine’s skies and seas, but not to the frontline with Russia.
On Tuesday morning, Prime Minister Keir Starmer held a virtual call to brief over 30 other world leaders on the discussions that took place at the White House on Monday.
Following this, Downing Street announced: “The prime minister outlined that coalition of the willing planning teams would meet with their US counterparts in the coming days to further strengthen plans to deliver robust security guarantees and prepare for the deployment of a reassurance force if the hostilities ended.”
It comes after an expert warned Trump is displaying “classic signs” of a horror disease that “will get worse..”
https://www.themirror.com/entertainment/tv/cnn-breaking-news-donald-trump-1341186
The Stop Trump Coalition said the vice president will “find the resistance waiting” on his English summer break, an ocean and almost 4,000 miles from DC.
Anti-Trump protesters have warned that they will derail JD Vance’s planned English countryside escape.
The vice president, his wife Usha, and their three children are expected to explore London in mid-August, rent a cottage in the Cotswolds, and then travel to Scotland, according to The Telegraph.
The Cotswolds is a stunning area full of rolling hills and quaint villages in southwest England, which is frequented by the wealthy elite, including Hugh Grant, David Beckham, and King Charles. But a serene stay is set to be hijacked by “a coalition of pro-Palestinian demonstrators, climate protesters and trade unions,” the British publication reported.
Ellen DeGeneres, who decided to move to the U.K. with wife Portia de Rossi after Trump’s re-election, is also a recent American expat living in the area. DeGeneres said over the weekend that she had found an oasis of calm. “We got here the day before the election and woke up to lots of texts from our friends with crying emojis, and I was like, ‘He got in,’” DeGeneres told the BBC. “And we’re like, ‘We’re staying here.’”
The Stop Trump Coalition has pledged to ensure that Vance’s merriment falls as flat as it did when he visited Disneyland with his brood earlier this month. Demonstrators gathered outside the hotel he was believed to be staying at to protest the Trump administration’s aggressive immigration raids in California.
The group, which helped mobilize mass protests against Donald Trump’s first state visit to the U.K. in 2019, warned that even in the heart of the English countryside, the vice president “will find the resistance waiting.”
A spokesman told The Telegraph that the group also plans to Trump’s visit to Scotland later this week, when the president will open a new golf course named after his Scottish mother, and a second full state visit planned for September.
“We are meeting Trump with protests in Aberdeen and Edinburgh this month, and then in London and Windsor in September,” they said.
“J.D. Vance is every bit as unwelcome in the U.K. as Donald Trump. We remember how Vance cut short his ski trip in Vermont because he was so enraged by the sight of a few protesters.
“We are sure that, even in the Cotswolds, he will find the resistance waiting.”
In March, protesters in Vermont forced Vance and his family to flee a ski resort after demonstrations sprang up against the administration’s Ukraine stance.
He was told to “go ski in Russia,” and branded a “national disgrace.”
The Vances were also met with resistance at Disneyland earlier this month. Over 100 protesters turned up the day before he arrived to speak out against the Trump administration’s mass deportations in a demonstration outside the Grand Californian Hotel, where the Vances were booked.
A smaller crowd of protesters showed up the day he arrived, with the park reportedly shutting down certain rides for the Vances to enjoy privately, causing delays for other park guests.
Even California Gov. Gavin Newsom blasted Vance in an X post, writing, “Hope you enjoy your family time, @JDVance. The families you’re tearing apart certainly won’t.”
The Stop Trump Coalition, meanwhile, has also said it will protest against the president’s visit. He will jet into Scotland, where he has business interests, meeting Prime Minister Keir Starmer in Aberdeen, on the country’s northeast coast.
The group previously said it will hang anti-Trump banners and flags along roadsides and position a huge message on a beach to be visible from the sky.
https://www.thedailybeast.com/vances-vacation-plans-immediately-hit-with-protest-threats
