There are many unanswered questions globally this week with talk of ending the war between Russia and Ukraine - despite Ukraine and much of Europe not even involved in negotiations that have reportedly taken place between the U.S. and Russia, plus a key deadline Saturday in the conflict between Israel and Hamas.
There's also major political news out of Minnesota with Senator Tina Smith (D) saying she will not run for re-election in 2026.
Chief Washington Correspondent for CBS News, Major Garrett, fleshes out a lot of that and answers questions from Vineeta Sawkar on the WCCO Morning News Friday as the world waits to see what comes next after another hectic week in Washington.
"They got themselves into something I think they wish they didn't. If I were president it would not have happened, and it didn't happen for four years," President Trump said on Thursday.
Where does that leave the Ukrainians? Trump upended years of steadfast U.S. support for Ukraine this week following a phone call with Russian President Vladimir Putin, a move that has shaken Ukraine and other leaders in Europe.
So, if you're the Ukrainians, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy, you really don't know where you stand. The President first talked to Vladimir Putin, then talked to Zelenskyy. The Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth said, 'well, there are a couple of things Ukraine wants, but they're unrealistic, regaining territory that Russia seized in 2014 in Crimea, maybe joining NATO in the future,' basically taking them off the table.
Well, if you're the Ukrainians, you're like, wait a minute. Are we in these negotiations or not? Are our interests, is our sovereignty, is our future as an independent nation going to be protected in any conversations about peace? Because what does peace mean to Trump? What does peace mean to Pete Hegseth or the Secretary of State Marco Rubio? We don't know.
All the president keeps emphasizing is the imperative to end this war. Well, on what terms and if there is peace between Russia and Ukraine, how is Ukraine's future guaranteed against another Russian invasion? This is very much on the minds of the Ukrainians and the Europeans. How do you guarantee that Russia won't invade again? Do you put international peacekeepers on the border? If so, what nations make up those peacekeeping forces? What are their responsibilities to repel any potential future Russian invasion?
These are very hard things to sort out. Peace is a a concept. Implementing and guaranteeing it for Ukraine is a very big deal and right now, based on what the Ukrainians are saying in full public view, is Russia keeps attacking, keeps bombing, and no one seems to be voicing our most important needs, to achieve a just end of this war, which we didn't start and we've suffered from the most. So it's hard to know what the bottom line for President Trump is. He rarely discusses his bottom lines in public. That makes this all a little bit more opaque than the Ukrainians are comfortable with, but that's where we are.
Note: Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said Friday during a meeting with U.S. Vice President JD Vance that his country wants “security guarantees” before any talks to end the Ukraine-Russia war.
What about this Saturday noon deadline that President Trump is talking about related to the hostages?
So he said, if all hostages held by Hamas are not released, all hell will break loose or something to that effect. That seems to have moved the forces within Hamas and Gaza to say, 'yes, the ceasefire is going to hold, hostages will continue to be released.' But that's all up for the president's satisfaction and the Israeli government's satisfaction on Saturday. There's a process by which hostages are released piecemeal, meaning gradually.
The Israeli government having received the hostages so far, now come to understand their deepest fears were realized while those hostages were in captivity. They were abused, tortured, molested and worse. We don't want to wait anymore. Stop this phase stuff. We want all of the people back as rapidly as possible. Will Hamas comply? If not, what does the Israeli government do? Does it restart the war? And if it does, does it do so with a green light from the Trump administration? All of this is up for grabs and will be known in the not too distant future.
With every issue, you list questions and I feel like that's a lot of what's going on right now. We're just asking a lot of questions?
There are, and that's one of the things that The Trump effect has, on not only national politics but global politics. What is the intention of the most powerful country in the world, the United States? What is its negotiating leverage? How does it intend to use it against friend and foe?
Trust me, this is not just a sort of national security military question. It's an economic question. The European Union wants to know that. Japan wants to know that. South Korea, Canada, Mexico, our friends want to know how aggressive, how "hostile" the Trump administration will be on trade and tariffs. Nobody really knows the bottom line on that. What they do know is the economic waters are churned, the geopolitical waters are churned and right now it seems to be the one person who's churning the most, maybe to his satisfaction, maybe just to his amusement, maybe to get some larger grand deal, is the president.
Specifically related to Minnesota, everything just went up in smoke yesterday when Senator Tina Smith (D) said she's not going to run again in two years. Lieutenant Governor Peggy Flanagan jumped right in. It was almost as if she knew this was going to happen. So we wait to hear what Governor Tim Walz is going to do. I just wonder, him being on the national ticket, has that raised his profile enough nationally?
So, I think it's very much an open question, whether Governor Walz would attract substantial outside donor money for a race for the Senate. Not because he didn't become more prominent, he certainly did. But did that prominence reassure Democrats that he would be a formidable candidate for a Senate seat? And if elected, a solid and stalwart member of the party in the United States Senate?
I'd say it's probably 60/40 yes on that, but the big, I think, hesitation that donors would have is the vice presidential nominee's performance in the debate against JD Vance. I'm not saying that was the signal moment of the campaign. But it was one of the top five, and it didn't land well for the governor. It didn't land well for the Harriz-Walz ticket, and it didn't land well for the trajectory of where that campaign ultimately ended. And it was one of those moments where you began to feel the ground shift in the Trump-Vance direction. That doesn't accumulate well for Governor Walz.
I'm not saying he's not going to run. I'm not saying he wouldn't get a fair amount of money. I'm not saying he wouldn't win. I'm just saying that among national Democratic donors, there will be that core of hesitation.
And just secondarily, and I don't know all the ins-and-outs of state politics, I don't pretend to. But I will just say Senator Smith's announcement fits with Gary Peters's announcement in neighboring Michigan, and it gives you a sense for those of us watching the national map of this deep sense of deflation that Democrats feel. They just don't have the heart for another run. They're just not sure what's the point of being around Washington for the next six years. And whether that's true or not, and every decision made by someone seeking re-election is a deeply personal one, I respect that for Senator Smith, for Senator Peters, for everyone in this arena, but it just gives you the feeling that wow, Democrats not only look deflated internally, they feel it.