Witkoff Flatters Putin at Kremlin, Sparking Backlash

Tommy Vietor, a former National Security Council spokesman, wrote: "This to a man launching ballistic missiles at maternity hospitals and stealing Ukrainian children en masse. Humiliating bootlicking."

Jay Beecher, a Ukraine-based journalist, wrote: "I never thought I'd see the day where America acted so weak. But here they are, sucking up to a mass-murdering Russian dictator who happens to also be helping Iran to kill American troops."

Economist Lars Christensen called Witkoff's comments a "disgrace." Economist Michael MacKay wrote that "Steve Witkoff addresses his true love, the war criminal."

British war studies lecturer Ruth Deyermond mocked the line: "It'll be an incredible memory for us all. The time the US president sent two of his closest, if least competent, aides to flatter the autocrat responsible for an unprovoked war against a neighbour and the murder of many thousands of its citizens. In front of the world's cameras."

Military tech blogger Jim Stewartson called the meeting a "combination of treason, conflict of interest, and sheer corruption never seen at this level of geopolitics."