Trump Lashes Out at Zelensky: ‘Not a Good Guy for Us to Deal With’

President Donald Trump lashed out at Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, declaring that the leader is “not a good guy for us to deal with.”

Just last week, the president made the shocking announcement that Russian President Vladimir Putin had agreed to bail out the U.S. diesel market as the ongoing war in Iran continues to drive up fuel prices for Americans. Notably, Trump had only recently signed legislation restricting U.S. business dealings with Russia, though the Treasury Department formally lifted the relevant sanctions the same day the president announced the deal.

Two days later, the president claimed that Russia and Ukraine had agreed to an “energy ceasefire” — news Zelensky said came as a surprise to him. Just hours after that announcement, though, Putin launched an attack on a power plant in eastern Ukraine.

Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine has dragged on since February 2022.

Trump sat down with Newsmax’s Rob Finnerty for an interview Thursday as Ukraine resumed strikes on Russian energy targets, arguing that Moscow’s attacks had never stopped.

“I thought you asked President Zelensky not to do that,” noted Finnerty.

“I did,” Trump said. “Zelensky is not a good guy for us to deal with.”

“Have you lost faith in him?” the Newsmax host followed up.

“I think they’re gonna end up with a settlement of some kind,” the president predicted. “They’re not gonna do it with him. He doesn’t wanna settle. He says he wants to settle, but he doesn’t. No, I’m not a big fan of Zelensky. They’ve destroyed that country.”

Trump went on to partially blame the war in the region on former President Barack Obama, pointing to Russia’s 2014 annexation of Crimea, which took place during Obama’s presidency.

“If the U.S. election weren’t rigged,” the president claimed, “that war would have never happened. That’s the saddest part… Ukraine has lost so many of its men, and Russia, too, but Russia’s a massive country.”

“Does that war end before you leave office?” Finnerty wondered.

“It should end soon,” the president promised. “I think they actually both would like to see it end, but I find Zelensky to be more difficult to deal with than Putin.”

During a Wednesday interview with Piers Morgan, Zelensky responded in the affirmative when asked if he feels “betrayed” by Trump’s diesel deal with Putin, adding that he sees it as a “pity” to be losing a “strong partner” in the U.S. and that doing business with the Russian president is the “not right side of history.”

Watch the above on Newsmax.

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