WASHINGTON – In a speech Friday, Vice President JD Vance defended President Trump's foreign policy approach as a way to live with Catholic teachings on peace.
“We must, of course, recognize the need for President Trump to bring peace, whether it's Russia or Ukraine or the Middle East, as a policy directed at implementing one of Christ's most important commandments,” the Vice President said in a statement at Washington, D.C.'s National Catholic Prayer Breakfast.
Vance, 40, is one of the most solid supporters of Trump's “America First” policy, and has become acutely disagreement with Zelensky about the Ukrainian leader's approach to ending a three-year conflict with Russian President Vladimir Putin's military.
Zelensky called Vance “too extreme” last September. This is because the VP opposed further US military or economic aid to Kyiv and once said, “I don't care what will happen in any way or in any way.”
While still serving in the US Senate, Vance told CNN in December 2023, “Accepting America's greatest interests… Ukraine requires giving away territory to the Russians.”
Zelensky said he hopes Ukraine will reclaim all the territory currently occupied by Russia.
Earlier this week, Trump said that he hopes to reclaim as much land as possible in Ukraine, but that would be difficult because Putin doesn't want to give up.
Vance in his Friday speech also defended Trump as an advocate for the Christian community around the world through his commitment to religious freedom.
“For the past 40 years, it has often been historic Christian communities that have been the brunt of failed American foreign policy, so I think we must recognize it as an effort to protect Christian religious freedom,” Vance told a Catholic audience in the country's capital.
“It's probably the most important way in my opinion that Donald Trump has been a champion of Christian rights around the world, because he has a foreign policy directed towards peace.”
Trump said he wanted to achieve peace between Russia and Ukraine, and is signing a mineral contract with Zelensky on Friday to establish the U.S. Ukraine Joint Mineral Fund.
He has no date to discuss the war to face Putin, but he has sent his delegation to Saudi Arabia to meet with Russian officials for a better relationship.
Vance told Zelensky in an interview last week that “budmouth” Trump was not a good idea if he had Ukrainian interests in mind, when Trump was in mind the interests of Ukraine, who lived in a “disinformation” space created by Russia.
He also told European countries at the Munich Security Conference that the “biggest threat” to the continent is not Russia or China, but the “retreat of Europe from some of its most fundamental values.”
