Back from the Munich Security Conference where she heard Alexei Navalny‘s widow react in real time to news of the Russian opposition leader’s death, former House Speaker and current California Congresswoman Nancy Pelosi wore her symbolism pinned to her chest during an interview with MSNBC’s Jen Psaki.
Before taking Psaki’s question about former President Donald Trump‘s refusal to criticize Russian leader Vladimir Putin in the wake of Navalny’s death in a Russian prison, Pelosi went out of her way to first explain the pin she wore, featuring cherries.
Pelosi chose her jewelry, she said, to honor George Washington who — legend has it — confessed to chopping down a cherry tree because, he said, “I cannot tell a lie.”
“Now we’re talking about a former President who cannot tell the truth,” Pelosi said.
Addressing Trump’s failure to condemn Putin — as many world leaders have — for the death of Navalny, the 47-year-old Putin opposition figure, Pelosi wondered aloud — not a new speculation — what Putin “has” on Trump.
“Now [Putin’s] pal in the United States, Donald Trump — and you wonder what does Putin have on Donald Trump that he always has to be beholden to him, his buddy, his buddy in vileness,” Pelosi said.
Pelosi said Trump’s statement on Navalny’s death was “beneath the dignity of a human being.” The statement Pelosi describes is below:
Pelosi then conjectured the lever Putin may use to keep Trump loyal is “something financial” — Putin is among the wealthiest men in the world, and Trump’s finances are presently battered — or, she said, “something on the come, something he expects.”
That speculation — that Trump may have some future expectation — jibes with the theory that, even if Trump has not participated in coordinating the efforts, Putin’s forces have worked to influence American elections with an eye toward engineering Trump wins.
For years observers have puzzled over Trump’s fealty to Putin, feeding speculation that has only grown recently as the Trump-controlled GOP has stepped up its efforts to block American aid to Ukraine for its war against Russia.
Back during Trump’s first run for President, rumors that Putin had filmed Trump in his hotel room during a stay in Moscow fueled the speculation that Trump was under Putin’s thumb. Pelosi’s conjecture presents two different levers — pure financial considerations, or election help — that nevertheless seem to produce the same result.
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