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munich security conference
Sanders Urges Europe to 'Stand Tall' Against Far-Right Boosted by Trump and Musk
"European friends: Do not accept lectures on democracy and freedom of speech from an administration that denies the 2020 election results and is now suing and intimidating news outlets whose reporting they don't like," said U.S. Sen. Bernie Sanders.
Feb 16, 2025
U.S. Sen. Bernie Sanders urged Europeans on Saturday to "stand tall against right-wing extremism" after the American vice president scolded the continent's leaders for not accommodating parties like the neo-Nazi Alternative for Germany, which appears poised for a strong performance in the approaching general election.
"European friends: Do not accept lectures on democracy and freedom of speech from an administration that denies the 2020 election results and is now suing and intimidating news outlets whose reporting they don't like," Sanders (I-Vt.) wrote in a social media post after U.S. Vice President JD Vance used his address at the Munich Security Conference to blast Germany's "firewall" against Alternative for Germany, also known as AfD.
Vance's speech was praised by AfD leader Alice Weidel—with whom the vice president met on Friday—and U.S. President Donald Trump, who called his second-in-command's remarks "very brilliant" as they sparked revulsion and open condemnation from European leaders.
The Guardian's Patrick Wintour characterized Vance's speech as "a call to arms for the populist right to be able to seize power in Europe, and a promise that the 'new sheriff in town' would help them to do so."
"Right-wing extremism is not just an American phenomenon. It's worldwide."
On Sunday, around 30,000 people took to the streets of Berlin to condemn Germany's far-right and specifically AfD, which has also been embraced by U.S. billionaire Elon Musk. AFP reported that "many carried placards with slogans denouncing" AfD, "which is expected to become the second-biggest party in next Sunday's vote."
One demonstrator, identified as 71-year-old Hannelore Reiner, told AFP that in the current moment she sees "a lot of parallels to 1933, to the time before the war when Hitler's fascism came to power."
"I'm afraid history will repeat itself," she said.
Sunday's protests came a week after hundreds of thousands of people took to the streets of Munich to protest the far-right—and a week ahead of Germany's closely watched general election on February 23.
The Associated Press noted Friday that AfD's rise in Germany "has coincided with that of far-right parties in many other European countries, including Austria's Freedom Party and the National Rally in France, with which it has plenty of common ground."
"Weidel was in Budapest to visit Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán on Wednesday," the AP added.
Following last weekend's demonstrations in Munich, Sanders emphasized that "right-wing extremism is not just an American phenomenon."
"It's worldwide," the senator wrote. "We're in solidarity with our friends in Germany who are standing tall against oligarchy, authoritarianism, and racism—and the AfD, the Musk-supported party."
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Vance Faces Backlash Over Embrace of Germany's Far-Right Just Ahead of Election
Rebuking the U.S. vice president, German Chancellor Olaf Scholz said that "a commitment to 'never again' is not reconcilable with support for the AfD."
Feb 15, 2025
U.S. Vice President JD Vance faced growing backlash on Saturday after scolding the European political establishment for shunning far-right parties and subsequently meeting with the leader of the neo-Nazi Alternative for Germany, just a week ahead of the country's general election.
While Vance did not explicitly mention Alternative for Germany, or AfD, during his remarks Friday at the Munich Security Conference, he declared that "there is no room for firewalls"—a reference to mainstream German political parties' refusal to work with AfD or include it in governing coalitions.
The Guardian reported that "a whisper of 'Jesus Christ' and the squirming in chairs could be heard in an overflow room" during the U.S. vice president's remarks, which he delivered a week after hundreds of thousands took to the streets of Munich to protest far-right extremism.
Following his speech, Vance met with AfD leader Alice Weidel, who praised the vice president's Munich address as "excellent" in a post on X—a social media platform owned by billionaire Elon Musk, who has also expressed support for AfD as he works to dismantle agencies throughout the U.S. government.
Reuters reported that Weidel—whose grandfather was a Nazi judge appointed directly by Adolf Hitler—met with Vance at his hotel "for about 30 minutes and discussed the Ukraine war, German domestic policy, and freedom of speech."
Vance was the highest-ranking U.S. official to ever meet with the leader of the AfD, which is seen as the most extreme of Europe's far-right parties.
On Saturday, German Chancellor Olaf Scholz rebuked Vance and said that "we will not accept outsiders intervening in our democracy," even "friends and allies."
"Never again fascism, never again racism, never again aggressive war," Scholz said in his speech at the Munich Security Conference. "That is why an overwhelming majority in our country opposes anyone who glorifies or justifies criminal National Socialism."
"A commitment to 'never again' is not reconcilable with support for the AfD," said Scholz.
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After Calls, Trump Claims Putin and Zelenskyy Want to 'Make Peace' in Ukraine
His comments came after the defense secretary made clear the Trump administration opposes NATO membership for Ukraine and thinks that returning to the country's "pre-2014 borders is an unrealistic objective."
Feb 12, 2025
After phone calls with Russia and Ukraine's leaders on Wednesday, U.S. President Donald Trump claimed on social media that settlement talks will begin immediately, nearly three years into the Kremlin's invasion of the neighboring nation.
Trump said on his Truth Social platform that during the "lengthy and highly productive phone call" with Russian President Vladimir Putin, the pair discussed a wide range of issues and agreed that "we want to stop the millions of deaths taking place in the War with Russia/Ukraine." (Although the estimates for civilian and troop deaths since February 2022 vary, they aren't in the millions.)
"We agreed to work together, very closely, including visiting each other's Nations. We have also agreed to have our respective teams start negotiations immediately," wrote the U.S. president in his post. "I have asked Secretary of State Marco Rubio, Director of the CIA John Ratcliffe, National Security Adviser Michael Waltz, and Ambassador and Special Envoy Steve Witkoff, to lead the negotiations which, I feel strongly, will be successful."
"I want to thank President Putin for his time and effort with respect to this call, and for the release, yesterday, of Marc Fogel," Trump added, referring to an American teacher whose imprisonment in Russia was widely seen as "essentially a hostage-taking situation."
Later, Trump told reporters that he expects his first meeting with Putin to happen in Saudi Arabia, "not in the too distant future."
As of September, the U.S. Congress had appropriated or made available nearly $183 billion to help Ukraine respond to the 2022 Russian invasion. This week Trump said Ukraine should reward the United States with $500 billion worth of precious minerals in exchange for its military support.
After a subsequent call with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy on Wednesday, Trump posted: "The conversation went very well. He, like President Putin, wants to make PEACE. We discussed a variety of topics having to do with the War, but mostly, the meeting that is being set up on Friday in Munich, where Vice President JD Vance and Secretary of State Marco Rubio will lead the Delegation. I am hopeful that the results of that meeting will be positive. It is time to stop this ridiculous War, where there has been massive, and totally unnecessary, DEATH and DESTRUCTION. God bless the people of Russia and Ukraine!"
Vance and Rubio will travel to Germany for the Munich Security Conference, which is scheduled to begin on Friday. Ahead of that summit, the Ukraine Defense Contact Group on Wednesday held a meeting at NATO headquarters in Brussels, where U.S. Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth delivered headline-making opening remarks.
The U.S. president "intends to end this war by diplomacy and bringing both Russia and Ukraine to the table," said Hegseth. "We want, like you, a sovereign and prosperous Ukraine. But we must start by recognizing that returning to Ukraine's pre-2014 borders is an unrealistic objective. Chasing this illusionary goal will only prolong the war and cause more suffering."
"The United States does not believe that NATO membership for Ukraine is a realistic outcome of a negotiated settlement. Instead, any security guarantee must be backed by capable European and non-European troops," he continued. "To be clear, as part of any security guarantee, there will not be U.S. troops deployed to Ukraine."
Anatol Lieven, director of the Quincy Institute for Responsible Statecraft's Eurasia Program, explained that "in practice, Hegseth's statement also rules out European troops for Ukraine. Russia has made clear that it will accept only troops from genuinely neutral countries as peacekeepers, and European leaders have stated that they would only deploy their own troops if given a cast-iron assurance by the U.S. that America would come to their aid if attacked—an assurance that Hegseth has just ruled out."
Lieven also wrote:
In his statement to the other NATO defense ministers, Hegseth repeatedly stressed the words "realistic" and "realistically." Realistically, it was obvious for years before the Ukraine War that NATO countries would never fight to defend Ukraine; and on the eve of the invasion, the Biden administration and every other NATO government refused to give Ukraine a timetable for membership. Yet at the same time, they preserved the public illusion that Ukraine would one day join NATO, and they refused to negotiate a treaty of neutrality with Moscow.
Since the failure of the Ukrainian counter-offensive in 2023, 16 months ago, it has been obvious that Ukraine could not regain its lost territories, but Western officials went on committing themselves publicly to this outcome and rejecting territorial compromise. Something in the region of a quarter of a million human beings have now died so that Western establishments could continue to propagate these illusions. It is time to let them go, and we should be grateful to Hegseth for saying so.
Progressive critics of the U.S. policy in Ukraine have long argued that Trump's predecessor, former President Joe Biden, was not leveling with the American people when it came to the likely outcomes in Ukraine and that his failure to foster the conditions for peace talks or a negotiated settlement meant the fighting would drag on without end.
Trump's supposed quest for securing peace in Russia and Ukraine contrasts with his unpopular imperialistic ambitions in other cases—he's recently
proposed U.S. takeovers of Canada, Greenland, the Gaza Strip, and the Panama Canal.
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