We saw a collective freakout from liberals in the media over the first Cabinet meeting of the second Trump administration on Wednesday. Elon Musk, who as White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt reminded, works with the president and Cabinet secretaries to get to the bottom of government fraud and waste, was present for such a meeting. As Townhall has been reminding, then First Lady Jill Biden not only attended by led Cabinet meetings during the previous administration. Any outrage is completely misplaced. The meeting was indeed held on Wednesday, where Musk did speak. While President Joe Biden could rarely ever be bothered to take questions, President Donald Trump and Vice President JD Vance had no problem taking them, and put the media in their place in the process.
The media has made much of Trump's handling of negotiations for an end to the Russo-Ukrainian war, which began three years ago on Monday. Russian President Vladimir Putin was emboldened enough to attack under the particularly weak and ineffective Biden-Harris administration, especially when it comes to foreign policy, and especially after the disastrous withdrawal from Afghanistan.
Trump later reminded when taking questions that Biden "could have prevented that war," adding Putin "would have never gone in" and that "the war would never have taken place if I were president." Polling conducted not long after Putin's invasion of Ukraine shows that voters agreed with Trump on that assessment.
In taking a question, Vance referenced the president's handling of foreign policy, which is not to advertise it to the world ahead of time. "I mean, look, as the president said, we're not going to do the negotiation in public with the American media. He's going to do it in private with the president of Russia, with the president of Ukraine, and with other leaders," he reminded. "I think that's how this has to go," he continued, as he "pushed back" against criticism, not just from the media, but also Democrats whom they're often aligned with. "Every single time the president engages in diplomacy, you guys preemptively accuse him of conceding to Russia. He hasn't conceded anything to anyone. He's doing the job of a diplomat, and he is of course the diplomat-in-chief as the president of the United States."
.@VP: "We're not going to do the negotiation in public with the American media... Every single time the President engages in diplomacy, you guys pre-emptively accuse him of conceding to Russia. He hasn't conceded anything to anyone. He's doing the job of a diplomat." pic.twitter.com/fZs3owVOq0
— Rapid Response 47 (@RapidResponse47) February 26, 2025
During that same Cabinet meeting, Trump had actually announced that Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy will be at the White House on Friday to sign an agreement to develop rare earth and critical minerals in the country.
"We're going to do the best we can to make the best deal we can for both sides," Trump also later shared about an end to the war, which includes trying to "get as much back as possible" for Ukraine, a line he stressed. At that moment, Vance even joked to Trump that "sir, they want you to negotiate with them instead of about the peacekeepers," to laughter from those present.
Once the laughter subsided, Trump reminded that "it's possible" there may not even be a peace deal, though he hopes there is, "for the sake of humanity."
Trump also reminded the press about the damage that his predecessor had done and what he had "gotten away with" as "a disgrace to our nation." The president had a message for the press on this point too, in that they "don't write the fair thing," adding "but, you know, the good news is the people see it and that's why we won the election by so much."
At the very end of the meeting, as the press had been dismissed and were exiting, Trump and Vance even quipped about peacekeepers, with Vance asking, "Sir, how many peacekeepers are going to sit there?"