UK PM Keir Starmer greets Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy at 10 Downing Street Saturday after Zelenskyy’s heated Friday White House meeting. Scroll down this column for details.
SOTU Tonight – Technically, it’s not a State of the Union address, as they normally take place in January or February and in a non-inaugural year, but Donald J. Trump is no normal president. He will address the US beginning 9 pm ET/6 pm PT Tuesday from the House chamber. Sen. Elisa Slotkin (D-MI), who beat her Republican opponent for the seat last November even as Trump won her state, will give the Democratic counter-message. As Trump said after his attack on Volodymyr Zelenskyy last Friday, should make for good TV.
As always … Your comments on tonight’s television gala are welcome at editors@thehustings.news and please indicate your political leanings in the subject line.
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T-Day – As promised, Trump tariffs of 25% on Canadian and Mexican goods were imposed at midnight Tuesday, with an extra 10% applied to Chinese goods (per NPR’s Morning Edition).
Le excusé … President Trump says he imposed the additional tariffs because of Chinese fentanyl crossing the US’ northern and southern borders.
China immediately imposed 15% on US chickens, wheat, corn and cotton, and 10% on sorghum, soybeans, pork, beef, aquatic products, fruits, vegetables and dairy, according to The New York Times.
Oh, Canada … Prime Minister Justin Trudeau counter-imposed tariffs on $20.8 billion in US imports, not including goods already in transit, with more duties likely to follow, Reuters reports. The lame-duck PM whose Liberal Party had faced almost certain defeat in elections called for later this year says that less than 1% of fentanyl intercepted at the border has come from Canada.
The Conservative Party of Canada’s likely candidate, Pierre Poilievre, is free-falling in Canadian popularity according to Morning Edition, as his party has been embracing a populist connection with President Trump’s MAGA conservatism. Up North, the Trump-style politics is known as “Maple MAGA.”
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Pause That Refreshes Russia – The Trump administration Monday suspended more than $1 billion in military aid that already had been committed to Ukraine. If the “temporary” suspension goes long, it will give Russia’s Vladimir Putin time to press for more territorial gains in the country he invaded three years ago.
“If this is true, it is a decision that can push the Kyiv regime to a peace process,” Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov told a press conference in Russian, as translated by the BBC.
A senior White House official told Bloomberg that the aid is on hold until President Trump determines that Ukraine’s leaders make a “genuine effort” toward peace.
Chairman of Ukraine’s foreign affairs committee Oleksandr Merezhko told The Kyiv Independent: “I don’t see that Trump is using leverage against the aggressor, he is using leverage against the victim of aggression. To stop military aid to Ukraine right now means to help Russia kill Ukrainians with impunity.”
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FBI Official Forced Out – The FBI’s top New York City official, James Dennehy, told colleagues he was forced out of the agency in an email Monday, NBC News reports. This comes a month after Dennehy vowed to “dig in” and resist the Trump administration’s purge of eight agents who investigated the January 6th assault on the US Capitol, including the head of the agency’s Washington field office, were fired.
“Late Friday, I was informed that I needed to put my retirement papers in today, which I did,” the email, passed on to NBC by FBI sources, read. “I was not given a reason for this decision.”
--TL
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UK Proposes Peace Deal for Ukraine
MONDAY 3/3/25
Meanwhile -- Pundit-at-Large Stephen Macaulay returns to the right column Monday to school President Trump on math and geography after the much-discussed Zelenskyy-Trump meeting at the White House. Read Macaulay’s Friday commentary in the left column and contributing pundit Rich Corbett’s commentary on same in the right column and submit your own comments to editors@thehustings.news.
Starmer Takes Charge – A group of nearly 20 other European leaders have been meeting with British Prime Minister Keir Starmer in the UK to secure a deal to end the war between Ukraine and Russia. President Volodymyr Zelenskyy flew to London after his disastrous Friday meeting with President Trump & Co. at the White House.
“We are at a crossroads in history,” Starmer said (per The Hill).
The British PM said the leaders agreed to keep aid flowing into Ukraine for an extended period of time to prepare for another Russian strike attempt during a ceasefire.
Latest in the talks is French Foreign Minister Jean-Noël Barrot has suggested a one-month truce between Ukraine and Russia to determine whether Vladimir Putin was “acting in good faith” in the negotiations.
Starmer also has suggested an additional 5,000 air defense missiles to Ukraine. They would be manufactured in Belfast and would help spur Northern Ireland’s economic growth. (This seems a good time to note that much of the military aid then-President Biden sent to Ukraine has returned to the US in the form of armaments purchases from US defense manufacturers.)
Part Four of Starmer’s plan is to deter a future Russian invasion, a “coalition of the willing,” to defend Ukraine.
In Kyiv, Ukraine’s deputy head of military intelligence, the HUR, Vadym Skibitskyi told RBC Ukraine (per The Kyiv Independent) that Russia plans to launch at least 500 drones per aerial attack. US Secretary of State Pete Hegseth meanwhile has ordered a pause in the US cyber-offensive against Russia, the BBC reports, which would seem to be particularly well-timed for such a drone attack.
Back in the States, congressional Republicans and White House officials took to Sunday’s news talk shows to suggest Zelenskyy display “more gratitude” and be more open to concessions to Russia’s Putin, The Associated Press reports. Some GOP Congress members suggested Zelenskyy resign, even as his popularity grows in his home country.
There was at least one exception: Sen. Lisa Murkowski (R-AK) who on Saturday posted this on Elon Musk’s X-Twitter: “I am sick to my stomach as the administration appears to be walking away from our allies and embracing Putin, a threat to democracy and U.S. values around the world.”
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Where’s DOGE Now? – The Federal Aviation Administration has ordered staff to look for tens of millions of dollars for a contract with Elon Musk’s satellite business, Starlink, to upgrade the system it uses to manage US airspace, Rolling Stone reports. A source with knowledge of the government agency and of two people briefed on the situation say the internal directives have been mostly or even entirely been given verbally, with the source saying “someone does not want a paper trail.” Musk reportedly has criticized Verizon, which formally holds a $2.4 billion contract for the FAA upgrade, and according to critical posts on his X/Twitter is about to take over the contract.
--Compiled and edited by Todd Lassa