Cheap political attacks have been part of American life since before the ink dried on the Constitution. Even George Washington took fire from scornful scribes accusing him—the man who freed us from the shackles of the British crown—of monarchist leanings.

But the latest hit job on Donald Trump’s tariff policy—accusing him of “sparing” Russia while targeting Ukraine—stands out for its sheer dishonesty. It’s not just lazy. It’s willfully misleading.

The claim—explicit or implied—echoed across the New York Times, Axios, BBC, and the global peanut gallery—that Trump “spared” Russia while targeting Ukraine is more than misleading. It’s a lazy distortion at best—built to deflect attention from what’s actually happening: a long-overdue reset of U.S. trade policy that, for once, puts America’s interests first.

Let’s be clear: Russia has not been “spared.” It’s already under a battery of sanctions and trade restrictions that make any discussion of tariffs functionally moot. Under Trump and Biden, U.S. policy has effectively walled off Russian goods—sanctioning everything from energy and banking to luxury items.

There’s no point in slapping tariffs on goods that can’t legally enter the country in the first place. Trump’s critics pretend not to understand that tariffs aren’t symbolic gestures—they’re economic instruments. You don’t use a wrench to saw a plank.

Ukraine, by contrast, gets preferential access to U.S. markets under special tariff regimes. Trump’s plan to realign that access isn’t about punishment but leverage. The Trump Doctrine doesn’t sort the world into saints and sinners, as the Beltway crowd likes to imagine. It treats every relationship—friend or foe—the same way: with a simple test of reciprocity, sovereignty, and strength calibrated by what serves American interests.

And here’s where the critics give up the game: the same media and political class now rending their duty-free Armani suits in performative agony over Trump’s tariffs on Ukraine were silent—or worse, supportive—when the Biden administration waived sanctions on the Nord Stream 2 pipeline in 2021.

That waiver let Russia’s state-aligned energy project proceed, cutting Ukraine out of transit revenues and deepening Germany’s dependence on Russian gas. If Trump had done the same, it would’ve triggered another impeachment.

But because it was Biden, the foreign policy elite just nodded along. Worse still, despite all the wailing from Eurocentric wonks on both sides of the Atlantic, it was that blunder, not tariffs or American steel, that helped keep the Russian war machine humming. Their pipeline. Their mistake.

So why the outcry now? Because Trump’s critics—ever desperate to cast him as a Kremlin pawn, facts be damned—can’t help themselves. Never mind the spectacular collapse of their collusion narrative over the past decade. They’ve pulled the Russia card yet again, twisting trade policy into their favorite bête noire: Russia collusion, the sequel no one asked for… and no one with sense wants to (Nord)stream.

The problem? The facts—stubborn things that they are—refuse to cooperate.

During an interview on ABC’s This Week, Kevin Hassett, who headed Trump’s Council of Economic Advisers, stated that tariffs aren’t about moral posturing—they’re a strategic form of leverage. Hassett explained that Russia was temporarily exempted due to ongoing peace negotiations with Ukraine, and that it would be “inappropriate” to disrupt those talks with a new trade barrier.

He emphasized that the exemption wasn’t permanent, noting, “It doesn’t mean that Russia, in the fullness of time, is going to be treated wildly different than every other country.” Hassett also revealed that more than 50 countries had already reached out to negotiate in response to the tariff announcement—a sign that the policy is working precisely as intended: forcing foreign powers to the table.

Moreover, the moral indignation rings hollow coming from a global class that funded Putin’s war machine for years while mocking Trump for trying to stop it. It was Trump who sanctioned Nord Stream 2. It was Biden who lifted those sanctions. And now we’re supposed to believe Trump is the one helping Russia?

The tired Washington consensus is unraveling—and Trump’s tariffs are both a symptom and a cure. They reject the notion that America must continually subsidize its allies, even as those same allies flood our markets, erode our industries, and evade their share of global responsibilities. If Ukraine wants continued American support, it must deal with a Washington that now operates from strength, not guilt.

In the end, this Russia narrative is a hackneyed canard—a tired distraction designed to obscure what’s really happening: a foundational reset in how America deals with friends and foes. 

And make no mistake, this isn’t Obama’s dusty reset button from Staples—it’s a serious recalibration grounded in strength, reciprocity, and less entanglement in the failed foreign and economic orthodoxies of the past. Washington—George, that is—would be proud.

Yet Trump’s critics remain trapped in an early Cold War archetype, where every shift in U.S. policy must somehow trace back to Moscow. Unable to grasp the new logic, they fall back on the only script they know: McCarthyite smears and reheated collusion drama.

But the truth is more straightforward. Tariffs on Ukraine are negotiable. American sovereignty is not. And those spreading this nonsense aren’t defending Ukraine—they’re defending the failed globalism that made Ukraine vulnerable in the first place.

Charlton Allen is an attorney, former chief executive officer, and chief judicial officer of the North Carolina Industrial Commission. He is the founder of the Madison Center for Law & Liberty, Inc., editor of The American Salient, and the host of the Modern Federalist podcast. X: @CharltonAllenNC

Image: Kremlin.ru, CC BY 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons, cropped.