Putin not a ‘bad guy’, Trump envoy says

WASHINGTON – White House envoy Steve Witkoff has praised Mr Vladimir Putin in glowing terms as trustworthy and said the Russian leader told him he had prayed for his “friend” US President Donald Trump when he was shot.

Mr Witkoff met Mr Putin over multiple hours last week in Moscow and told US media that the talks – which involved discussions about forging a path towards ending Russia’s war in Ukraine – were constructive and solution-based.

In an interview with right-wing podcast host Tucker Carlson, the envoy said he has come to regard Mr Putin as not a “bad guy”, and that the Russian President was a great leader seeking to end Moscow’s deadly three-year conflict with Kyiv.

“I liked him. I thought he was straight up with me,” Mr Witkoff said in the interview aired on March 21.

“I don’t regard Putin as a bad guy. That is a complicated situation, that war, and all the ingredients that led up to it.”

He also described a personal element of the discussion in which Mr Putin recalled his reaction to the assassination attempt on Mr Trump in July 2024 as the Republican held a campaign rally in Butler, Pennsylvania.

Mr Putin “told me a story... about how when the President was shot, he went to his local church and met with his priest and prayed for the President”, Mr Witkoff said.

“Not because... he could become the President of the United States, but because he had a friendship with him and he was praying for his friend.”

Mr Putin had commissioned a “beautiful portrait of President Trump from a leading Russian artist” and asked the envoy to take it home to Mr Trump, Mr Witkoff added. “It was such a gracious moment.”

Mr Witkoff’s gushing praise of a Russian President long seen by the United States as an autocratic adversary highlights the dramatic turn in Washington’s approach to dealings with the Kremlin since Mr Trump took office for a second presidential term.

Mr Witkoff also said Mr Volodymyr Zelensky was facing tough choices ahead and that the Ukrainian President should recognise it is time for him to “get a deal done” with Moscow.

Mr Zelensky is “in a very, very difficult situation, but he’s up against a nuclear nation”, Mr Witkoff said. “So he’s got to know that he’s going to get ground down. Now is the best time for him to get a deal done.”

Mr Witkoff’s comments essentially were delivered on friendly ground. Mr Carlson is a controversial former Fox News star who conducted what was widely considered to be a rare but soft interview with Mr Putin in 2024.

Mr Carlson has also been a leading propagator of pro-Kremlin narratives in the United States. AFP