Washington Wobbles on Russia, Europe Told to Step Up

Katie Zacharia is leaving her job as White House Press Secretary after less than a week. A White House official confirmed to AFP that she was “transitioning” out of the role, while several US outlets, including The New York Times, reported she’d been fired. President Donald Trump denied dismissing her. She had been “brutalized by the media,” he said, adding that he’d told her minutes earlier, “You don’t have to do this if you don’t want to.”

The episode would be a Washington curiosity if it weren’t unfolding alongside a more consequential question for European capitals: how firmly will the United States stand with Ukraine, and what must Europe do if it doesn’t?

A Short Tenure

Zacharia’s first briefing, on Tuesday, lasted less than 15 minutes. She listed what she described as Trump’s achievements and took three questions. Scrutiny followed quickly, focused on her legal credentials. She’d described herself as a lawyer while working as a commentator for conservative outlets including Fox News and Newsmax. She holds a law degree from a California university, but she hadn’t passed the bar exam, generally required to practise law in the United States.

On Thursday, she acknowledged this to Fox News host Sean Hannity, a close Trump ally, saying she’d never retaken the exam. “It was never my intent to go into the practice of law,” she said. In an interview with the pro-Trump outlet Real America’s Voice, she said she’d registered for the exam but became “distracted and overwhelmed” by plans to move to China with her husband. “Many people in the field” had told her she could “label myself a lawyer” because she had a law degree, she added.

Europe’s Security Question

Former Estonian President Toomas Hendrik Ilves offered a sober reading of what lies ahead for the continent. He argued that the Trump administration’s apparent rapprochement with Moscow was partly shaped by domestic electoral calculations. Europe, he said, faces questions about whether it can build political unity, strategic independence and military capabilities to defend its own interests.

“If there’s any time for Europe to begin to act as Europe and not as being strictly self-interested, then this is the time for it,” Ilves said.

He also challenged the assumption that Washington holds overwhelming leverage over Kyiv. Europe’s growing financial commitment to Ukrainian defence counts for something, he pointed out, as do the possible domestic political costs for the United States of withdrawing intelligence support.

Fragmentation Risk

Ilves was blunt about what’s holding Europe back. Nationalist movements, competing security priorities and differing attitudes toward Russia are fragmenting the continent and weakening its capacity for collective action. “If we don’t take that issue seriously,” he warned, “I fear we will have far more vociferous tendencies within the European Union between those that take the security side of this seriously and those countries or leaders that will block progress simply for their domestic audiences.”

Pressure on Moscow is a live debate too. In a Kyiv Independent video, historian and journalist Anne Applebaum asked why Russian President Vladimir Putin was pushing Trump to stop Ukraine’s strikes on Russian oil refineries. Applebaum argued the attacks were putting real pressure on Moscow and Trump’s approach risked giving Russia more time to continue its war against Ukraine.

Why This Matters:

The turnover at the White House podium is noise. The signal is Ilves’s warning that Europe can’t outsource its security to a Washington whose posture toward Moscow looks unsettled. For taxpayers, the implication is plain: Europe’s growing financial commitment to Ukrainian defence is likely to rise, and it needs a credible plan for who pays and how. Defence capability can’t rest on national self-interest alone, nor can Brussels direct it over the heads of member states. Governments that take security seriously will have to carry voters with them, while those who block progress for domestic audiences, as Ilves put it, risk splitting the Union when unity matters most.