Dave Weigel: Trump Just Wants Peace in Ukraine War So He Can Campaign for the Nobel Peace Prize

EXCERPT:

WEIGEL: “Well, Trump set the standard for himself very high during the campaign, which was that he had such a good relationship with Putin, he was going to end the war immediately, first day in office. He later said that was sarcastic, but just traveling the country, I would meet voters who thought Donald Trump was a peace president and Joe Biden was a chaos president because Trump could point to the record. And I can’t read the Russians’ minds, but Trump has been very political in what he wants out of this, which is some sort of deal that lets him say that he made peace, that lets him campaign for the Nobel Peace Prize. And I’m barely truncating what he said. He’s obsessed with some sort of recognition that — between the deals he’s making with Arab Emirates, between whatever he can do, he can pull off a Russia that he deserves some credit for peace. So they know that they just — what would the deal look like? Would it be like, would it roll back Ukrainian territory? Would it include the minerals deal? Those are almost immaterial because what he wants out of this is just the ability to say, I did what other presidents couldn’t have, and that gives him tons of room to negotiate around him.”