MSNBC’s Stephanie Ruhle Warns Putin’s Russian ‘Oligarchy’ Is ‘Attractive’ To Trump

 

MSNBC host Stephanie Ruhle lambasted the Trump administration for treating Russia like an “economic peer” and claimed that President Donald Trump finds the country’s “oligarchy” an “attractive” model.

As guest, Ruhle joined Morning Joe host Joe Scarborough in condemning the Trump administration for excluding the U.S.’s “best allies” in Europe from peace talks aimed at ending the war in Ukraine and threatening trade tariffs against them.

Ruhle unleashed on Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth for “making it seem as though Russia” is an “economic peer” before offering her own theory as to why Trump is viewing the country in such a “favorable way.”

[The] secretary of defense is the one who’s making it seem as though Russia is our economic peer. They’re not in any way. The only peer one could look at is if Donald Trump is looking at Vladimir Putin and his ultimate power over Russia, his ultimate personal wealth, that he’s one of the richest men in the world. The reason this administration could be looking at Russia in such a favorable way is the way that oligarchy is formed, is attractive to Donald Trump.

Theorizing that Trump will use tariffs and, more specifically, tariff exemptions to elevate himself as “kingmaker.” Arguing that Trump will hang the threat of tariffs over these countries until they come to bargain, she continued:

You have to go back to why Donald Trump is so keen on these tariffs or more importantly, tariff exemptions. It is the one place where the president sees himself as a potential kingmaker. He loves that we have the next month and a half while his Secretary of Commerce, Howard Lutnick, is going through country by country, starting in Europe, deciding how are we going to play ball, because during this period of time, those countries or specific companies, you’ve already seen the president talk about specific industries or companies that could get exceptions, they like nothing more than our quote unquote adversaries, who, in Europe’s case, are our partners to come to us and say: ‘What can we do? How do we do more business with you?’

These are already our allies. So the big question is, why are we putting that at risk when there are so many risky situations around the world in Europe and Canada? They’re not either.

Watch above on MSNBC.

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