Trump Backs Ukraine (Finally)

By Jim Geraghty

Tuesday, July 15, 2025

 

I’m thrilled to hear the news that the U.S. will be transferring weapons to our NATO allies, which our NATO allies will be transferring to Ukraine, and that new tariffs on Russia are in the works. You can read this morning’s National Review editorial about the moves here.

 

“It’s everything, it’s Patriots. It’s all of them. It’s a full complement, with the batteries,” President Trump said. Trump said the air-defense systems would arrive “very soon, within days actually, because a couple of the countries that have Patriots are going to swap over and we’ll replace the Patriots.”

 

These are the Patriots I can root for, having seen and heard them in action.

 

According to the Washington Post, Germany and Norway will each send Ukraine one missile battery and purchase replacements from the United States. According to CNN, “A battery consists of six to eight missile launchers, each capable of carrying up to 16 interceptors, along with a phased-array radar, a control station, a power generation station — all mounted on trucks and trailers.” A battery can cover about 40 to 80 square miles.

 

Yes, the details about the proposed tariffs on Russia are vague. Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick later said the U.S. could choose to impose either additional tariffs on Russia itself, or sanctions on countries that do business with Russia.

 

“We’re going to be doing very severe tariffs if we don’t have a deal in 50 days,” Trump said.

 

It’s not difficult to find headlines like, “Could Trump convince MAGA to support Ukraine?”

 

And yet, there’s evidence that the perception of widespread MAGA opposition to helping Ukraine is driven mostly by a couple of high-profile outspoken outliers, like Tucker Carlson.

 

Echelon Insights found that when asked, “Do you support or oppose continuing to give weapons to Ukraine for the conflict with Russia?” among those who describe themselves as bigger supporters of Trump than the Republican Party, 43 percent strongly or somewhat support giving weapons to Ukraine, 40 percent were strongly or somewhat oppose. When asked, “Do you support or oppose Donald Trump’s decision to continue to give weapons to Ukraine for the conflict with Russia?” The numbers among the same demographic shift to 53 percent support, 29 percent opposition.

 

Among those who describe themselves as bigger supporters of the Republican Party than Trump himself, when asked, “Do you support or oppose continuing to give weapons to Ukraine for the conflict with Russia?” 53 percent strongly or somewhat support giving weapons to Ukraine, and 38 percent oppose it. When the question is altered to, “Do you support or oppose Donald Trump’s decision to continue to give weapons to Ukraine for the conflict with Russia?” The numbers among the same demographic really shift, to 81 percent support, 14 percent opposition.

 

If you characterize describing yourself as more supportive of Trump than the GOP as “the MAGA base” — which seems like a reasonable decision — then MAGA is, at worst, about evenly split on supporting Ukraine. Once the decision to continue supporting Ukraine is characterized as Trump’s, barely a third of MAGA opposes the move, and Republicans as a whole overwhelmingly support the move.

 

The people who run around claiming to speak for MAGA may not really speak for MAGA.

 

Those who support the continued independence of Ukraine and standing up to Russian aggression should not look a gift horse in the mouth. This may not be everything Ukraine supporters wanted to see, and they likely want sanctions enacted sooner. But considering where the U.S. and the Ukrainians were back in early March, and the Oval Office clash earlier this year, this shift is nothing short of miraculous. And for that, ironically, we can thank Vladimir Putin and his arrogance, his hubris, his stubbornness, and his spectacularly self-destructive impulse to humiliate Trump.

 

Putin seemed to think he could drag out the negotiations endlessly and wear Ukraine down through relentless barrages against civilian targets. Since taking office in his second term, President Trump bent over backwards to try to get a deal on the table that would be acceptable to Putin.

 

Putin believed he could play Trump for a fool without serious consequence. Well, on Monday, the consequences arrived.

 

“I always hang up and say, ‘Well that was a nice phone call,’ and then missiles are launched into Kyiv or some other city,“ Trump said. “After that happens three or four times, you say the talk doesn’t mean anything. I go home, I tell the first lady, ‘You know, I spoke to Vladimir today. We had a wonderful conversation.’ She said, ‘Oh, really? Uh, another city was just hit.’”

 

It sounds like First Lady Melania Trump knows the score.

 

How to Cope When the President Does Something You Want Him to Do

 

President Trump says a lot of things. Some days he can sound like he’s fully behind DOGE, the next he can say he’ll “have to take a look” at deporting Elon Musk.

 

Trump signed the $10,000 cap on the state and local tax deduction into law in 2017. On the campaign trail in 2024, he pledged to “get SALT back,” and this year signed into a law a bill raising it to $40,000.

 

Trump also got the effort started to ban TikTok; he now refuses to enforce the law requiring its ban.

 

As laid out yesterday, Trump’s past comments certainly left the impression he would declassify and release all information the federal government had about Jeffrey Epstein’s crimes. Over the weekend, Trump fumed that everyone was still talking about Epstein and called the disgraced financier “somebody that nobody cares about.”

 

Donald Trump can often be erratic and fickle. With a handful of exceptions, he doesn’t care much about the details of government policy and just wants to be perceived as “winning.”

 

But a guy who makes that many decisions is sooner or later going to make some decisions you like.

 

Some people decide that they’re always going to agree with Donald Trump, even if what he’s saying today is a complete reversal of what he was saying yesterday. For example, Charlie Kirk announced Monday that he would no longer talk about Jeffrey Epstein, because the president called him and asked him not to talk about the topic any longer.

 

Here’s Charlie Kirk on stage at a conference alongside Megyn Kelly just this past Friday: “Raise your hand if it matters a lot to you. Raise your hand. So, every hand of 7,000 people. . . . I said a lot. Every hand.”

 

Some people decide that they’re always going to disagree with Trump, even if what he’s saying today is a complete reversal of what he was saying yesterday. Back during Trump’s first term, our Charlie Cooke laid out how Jen Rubin — at one time a Rudy Giuliani superfan — had changed her mind on many topics in a short period of time: the Paris Climate Accord, moving the U.S. embassy in Israel to Jerusalem, the Obama deal with Iran, tax cuts, welfare, gun control, and energy. When Trump took a position she previously supported, she shifted to oppose him and abandoned her previous perspective.

 

It’s a free country, and you can read who you like and listen to who you like. But I hope you know what you’re getting when you’re reading someone who turns on a dime because they reflexively agree or disagree with the president, no matter what he says or does.

 

Over here? I think it’s easier to know what you want to do, applaud the moves you agree with, and criticize the moves you oppose. This means the political landscape will have no permanent heroes and no permanent villains. Broken clocks are right twice a day, blind squirrels find nuts, and even a usually infuriating dolt like Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez can have a good idea or two in her proposals to prohibit members of Congress from trading stocks and a lifetime ban on former members of Congress from becoming lobbyists.

 

This means you’ll occasionally find yourself booing political figures that you usually support. Here in Virginia, Glenn Youngkin can be a great governor who inexplicably thinks it’s a good idea to move the Washington Commanders NFL franchise to his home state.

 

Charles Koch likes to quote abolitionist and orator Frederick Douglass: “I would unite with anybody to do right, and with nobody to do wrong.” That’s a good attitude to have and maximizes your opportunity to forge useful (although likely short-lived) alliances. Granted, it’s possible that some people will do such wrong that you cannot forgive them and make them a temporary ally.

 

Last week, this newsletter noted, “President Trump is bombing the Iranian nuclear facilities, bombing the Houthis and restoring freedom of the seas, getting NATO to dramatically increase defense spending . . . honestly, this guy is terrific — the best neocon president we’ve had in ages,” and I added: “that’s only about 35 percent tongue-in-cheek.”

 

Now it’s down to about 20 percent tongue in cheek. I don’t know what’s gotten into the president lately, but whatever it is, keep giving it to him. I’m sure someday in the not-too-distant future, Trump will once again start talking about annexing Canada, invading Greenland, or new tariffs on coffee or something. So enjoy the good times, because you never know when they’re going to end.