Trump Claimed Ukraine Started War With Russia

Despite Russia's multiple violent, deadly, and unjustified invasions of Ukraine, Trump sided with Vladimir Putin and claimed that Ukraine started the war.

Our Analysis

Despite Russia's repeated invasions of Ukraine, from Crimea in 2014 to the ongoing attack, Russia has been the obvious, unprovoked offender.

Authoritarian Russia under its dictator, Vladimir Putin, has been trying to claim Ukraine, a democracy, for itself.

Trump has seemingly sided with Russia's narrative and is repeating its lies.

For instance, Trump said that Ukraine's elected president, Zelenskyy, is the "Dictator", and that he "...should have never started [the war]."

We usually restrict posts on Stuff Trump Did to direct actions taken by Trump and his Administration with quantifiable impact, and although this was "just a statement", statements like this are extremely dangerous when they may convince his most fervent supporters of something wildly untrue, emboldening foreign dictators to seize land from their neighbors with democracies.

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Both sides aren't the same:

What the "other side" did

In the wake of Russia's annexation of Crimea in 2014, President Obama responded against Russia with sanctions but led an overall weak US response.

President Biden learned from this and led a far stronger US response, providing billions in weapons, intelligence, reinvigorating Putin's enemy NATO, and declaring that "Ukraine Will Never Be a Victory for Russia. Never."

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