23 hours ago 4

Treasury Secretary Compares Trump-Putin Meeting To Showing Off ‘Gun Case’ To ‘Uncontrollable Neighbor’

Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent weighed in Tuesday on President Donald Trump’s controversial summit in Alaska with Russian President Vladimir Putin last week.

While appearing on CNBC’s “Squawk Box,” Bessent told host Joe Kernen that he wanted to “set the record straight” about how the meeting went.

“Alaska was a show of force by President Trump. He invited President Putin to land that the Russians used to own. He displayed a huge amount of military hardware and then did a flyover,” Bessent said.

The Trump administration official then compared the meeting to “inviting your uncontrollable neighbor to your house and showing him your gun case.”

Calling Trump’s follow-up meeting on Monday with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy at the White House “very good,” Bessent declared that he has a “strong belief” that Trump will eventually help secure a meeting between Putin and Zelenskyy.

European leaders join Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy in talks with President Donald Trump on Aug. 18, as they try to find a way to end Russia's offensive in Ukraine.

“We had a very good meeting with [Zelenskyy] and his team in the Oval [Office] for about an hour and a half, and then we met with the European leaders who [were] an incredible group to have in the White House, all led by President Trump,” Bessent said.

He added: “And yes, the culmination of that was a call with President Putin, and my strong belief is that there will be a bilateral meeting between President Putin and President Zelenskyy. And that’s the only way to end this conflict, is to get the two sides talking.”

“Both sides are ready for this terrible [Ukraine-Russia] conflict to end,” Bessent later said.

After Trump and Putin wrapped up last week’s summit without announcing a ceasefire in the war in Ukraine, many political leaders were critical of the outcome.

Sen. Chris Murphy (D-Conn.) slammed the meeting as an “embarrassment to the United States,” and Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) confronted Trump for “selling out Ukraine.”

Meanwhile, Trump’s former national security adviser John Bolton opined on CNN that Putin had “won the summit” over a “tired” Trump.

Trump, who called his summit with Putin a “10 out of 10,” fired back at his critics in a series of blistering Truth Social posts on Monday.