‘Did I Say That?’ – Trump Dodges Question on Calling Zelensky ‘Dictator’

US President Donald Trump on Thursday said he doesn’t remember calling Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky a dictator. 

Asked by a reporter if he “still thinks that Mr. Zelensky is a dictator,” Trump first asked if he actually said it before dodging the question altogether. 

“Did I say that? I can’t believe I said that. Next question,” Trump said while addressing reporters alongside British Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer in the White House. 

Trump made the comment on his Truth Social platform on Feb. 19 when he berated Zelensky for supposedly starting Russia’s invasion of Ukraine and accusing him of being a “dictator without elections,” before falsely asserting that Ukraine’s president had only a 4% approval rating.  

“He refuses to have Elections, is very low in Ukrainian Polls, and the only thing he was good at was playing Biden ‘like a fiddle.’ A Dictator without Elections, Zelensky better move fast or he is not going to have a Country left,” Trump said in that update.

During his Monday meeting with French President Emmanuel Macron, when asked by reporters whether he would also label Russian leader Vladimir Putin as a dictator, Trump said he “[doesn’t] use those words lightly.”