First, Trump told his cabinet that “We get a lot of bullshit thrown at us by Putin”—his sharpest Putin criticism since 2016, according to The New York Times.
Then CNN obtained audio from a campaign donor meeting where Trump described threatening both Putin and Xi Jinping with devastating military responses. The leaked conversation reveals Trump claiming he told Putin: “If you go into Ukraine, I’ll bomb Moscow to hell. I’m telling you I have no choice.” He made similar threats to China’s Xi regarding Taiwan, saying he would “bomb Beijing.” Trump noted Xi “thought I was crazy” while Putin remained skeptical but “10% believed me.”

Russian Vladimir Solovyov, a key Kremlin TV host and propagandist, accused Trump of “Bidenization”—essentially becoming indistinguishable from his predecessor.

“Trump is transforming from the position ‘I’m the only one who can talk to Putin’ into another version of Biden,” Solovyov said, according to Agentstvo Novosti, which analyzed his talk shows. 

Why the harsh reaction? Solovyov questioned whether Trump now thinks “he can tell us what to do, and we’ll obey.”

Another television host Olga Skabeeva went further, comparing current US rhetoric to Colin Powell’s 2003 WMD presentation about Iraq. She suggested Washington was recycling old playbooks, using chemical weapons allegations as “a pretext to crush some regime.”

State broadcaster Rossiya 1 portrayed Trump as increasingly desperate, claiming his statements reflected understanding that Ukraine events weren’t “going according to his scenario.” The network described Trump as approaching his “personal Afghanistan.”

Russians call Trump “lover of loud statements”

Kremlin-affiliated social media accounts joined the pile-on. The Botnadzor monitoring project found roughly 25% of bot comments targeted Trump’s statements, calling him a “lover of loud statements” and suggesting he was merely “bluffing.”

The shift registered with Russian public opinion too. Princeton University’s Russia Watcher polling showed Trump’s approval among Russians hitting its lowest point since last fall—60% now disapprove, with 30% strongly opposing him.

Kremlin officials to continue dialogue with US

Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov maintained diplomatic language, saying Moscow expects “to continue our dialogue with Washington and our line of repairing the considerably damaged bilateral relations.”

Meanwhile, Trump’s administration resumed delivering critical military aid to Ukraine after a brief pause caused by Pentagon concerns over depleted US munitions stockpiles. The resumed shipments include 155mm artillery shells and precision-guided GMLRS rockets, essential for Ukraine’s front-line operations, particularly for its HIMARS rocket systems.

This resumption follows Russia’s largest-ever combined missile and drone attack on 9 July, when over 740 projectiles targeted Ukrainian infrastructure.