The Power Vertical Podcast by Brian Whitmore
Oct 16, 2026 · 53 min · 12 segments
On The Power Vertical Podcast this week, host Brian Whitmore discusses how oligarchic interests are increasingly shaping U.S. foreign policy decisions toward Russia's war against Ukraine and beyond…
Casey MichelGuest
Brian WhitmoreHost
Oh, so Casey, last time I had you on the podcast was just under a year ago, actually.
I checked it, and in December 2025, when the Trump administration's 28-point peace plan for Ukraine, the notorious 28-point peace plan, just became public.
At that time, a blockbuster report in The Wall Street Journal detailed how the US peace plan had little to do with Ukrainian security or American national interests.
Instead, it was all about ending Russia's isolation, reversing sanctions, and securing business and financial deals for the Kremlin and US insiders.
The Trump administration is again pressuring Ukraine into a unilateral ceasefire and accepting peace on Moscow's terms, and threatening to cut off satellite intelligence if Kyiv doesn't comply, if I can believe the reports I read this week.
And lo and behold, we have another blockbuster report, this one from The New York Times, revealing that the Trump administration was in talks with Russia about, quote, "A multi-million dollar oil deal that would benefit Middle Eastern business executives with ties to two US negotiators, Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner." According to the report, the deal involves, quote, "A sprawling set of oil fields, refineries, and gas stations around the world owned by Lukoil, one of Russia's biggest energy companies." Other deals reported in various media involve the Nord Stream gas pipeline, mineral mining in the Arctic, and Russian frozen assets in European banks.
None of this makes sense from a perspective of national interests, but all of it makes sense from the perspective of oligarchy and kleptocracy, which is why I thought of you when this week's depressing news broke.
Casey, I want to talk about your new book more broadly in the second block below the fold, but in this segment, I want to have you just put this week's news in context.
How does oligarchy and kleptocracy help us understand what we witnessed this week between Washington and Kyiv, where effectively the US just switched sides and basically is on the Russian side right now? I don't see any other way to put it.
Yeah, it's difficult to overstate just what a downturn relations between US and Kyiv have taken over the last week, even really over just the last few days, Brian, um, and how quickly that happened.
Uh, you know, these, uh, policies out of the Trump administration over the last 20 months or so, there have been multiple chapters, there have been multiple sections, there have been multiple, uh, elements and developments.
Of course, we all remember the February 2025 blowup in the Oval Office, but we also, I, I'm sure many of us remember how things seemed to actually, uh, improve over the course of 2025, and even through parts of 2026.
And, you know, here we are now, and it feels like we're right back at the beginning of Trump's, uh, second term, except this time around we have far more clarity on the kind of financial arrangements and financial contours, uh, surrounding this kind of, for lack of a better term, appeasement that the US is pursuing regarding Russia.
We've always had these elements of what appears to be the Trump administration going, uh, softer on Russia and perhaps harder on Ukraine with the idea, again, if you wanna, uh, uh, have an idea or a logic to it, that if we can provide sticks for the Ukrainians and carrots for the Russians-
... then maybe we can find an off-ramp, right? Maybe we can find a way to make a deal.
And what we've seen over the last 20 months is, of course, that didn't work, and yet here we are now in October of 2026, and it appears the theory of the case out of the White House is, "Well, let's just offer bigger sticks and bigger carrots.
Let's find more sweetheart deals with the Russians because at the end of the day, even if we can't necessarily find peace, at least we can get paid." And again, it's not just figures like Kushner and Witkoff.
Oh, so Casey, last time I had you on the podcast was just under a year ago, actually.
I checked it, and in December 2025, when the Trump administration's 28-point peace plan for Ukraine, the notorious 28-point peace plan, just became public.
At that time, a blockbuster report in The Wall Street Journal detailed how the US peace plan had little to do with Ukrainian security or American national interests.
Instead, it was all about ending Russia's isolation, reversing sanctions, and securing business and financial deals for the Kremlin and US insiders.
The Trump administration is again pressuring Ukraine into a unilateral ceasefire and accepting peace on Moscow's terms, and threatening to cut off satellite intelligence if Kyiv doesn't comply, if I can believe the reports I read this week.
And lo and behold, we have another blockbuster report, this one from The New York Times, revealing that the Trump administration was in talks with Russia about, quote, "A multi-million dollar oil deal that would benefit Middle Eastern business executives with ties to two US negotiators, Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner." According to the report, the deal involves, quote, "A sprawling set of oil fields, refineries, and gas stations around the world owned by Lukoil, one of Russia's biggest energy companies." Other deals reported in various media involve the Nord Stream gas pipeline, mineral mining in the Arctic, and Russian frozen assets in European banks.
None of this makes sense from a perspective of national interests, but all of it makes sense from the perspective of oligarchy and kleptocracy, which is why I thought of you when this week's depressing news broke.
Casey, I want to talk about your new book more broadly in the second block below the fold, but in this segment, I want to have you just put this week's news in context.
How does oligarchy and kleptocracy help us understand what we witnessed this week between Washington and Kyiv, where effectively the US just switched sides and basically is on the Russian side right now? I don't see any other way to put it.
Yeah, it's difficult to overstate just what a downturn relations between US and Kyiv have taken over the last week, even really over just the last few days, Brian, um, and how quickly that happened.
Uh, you know, these, uh, policies out of the Trump administration over the last 20 months or so, there have been multiple chapters, there have been multiple sections, there have been multiple, uh, elements and developments.
Of course, we all remember the February 2025 blowup in the Oval Office, but we also, I, I'm sure many of us remember how things seemed to actually, uh, improve over the course of 2025, and even through parts of 2026.
And, you know, here we are now, and it feels like we're right back at the beginning of Trump's, uh, second term, except this time around we have far more clarity on the kind of financial arrangements and financial contours, uh, surrounding this kind of, for lack of a better term, appeasement that the US is pursuing regarding Russia.
We've always had these elements of what appears to be the Trump administration going, uh, softer on Russia and perhaps harder on Ukraine with the idea, again, if you wanna, uh, uh, have an idea or a logic to it, that if we can provide sticks for the Ukrainians and carrots for the Russians-
... then maybe we can find an off-ramp, right? Maybe we can find a way to make a deal.
And what we've seen over the last 20 months is, of course, that didn't work, and yet here we are now in October of 2026, and it appears the theory of the case out of the White House is, "Well, let's just offer bigger sticks and bigger carrots.
Let's find more sweetheart deals with the Russians because at the end of the day, even if we can't necessarily find peace, at least we can get paid." And again, it's not just figures like Kushner and Witkoff.
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