From WNYC Studios, I'm Brian Lerer. This is my daily politics podcast. It's Monday, February 19th.

On the death of Alexei Navalny, Donald Trump seems to be playing it, kind of like he played the white supremacist rally

in Charlottesville in 2017, you know, when he famously said there were good people on both

sides. As usual, Trump is not condemning Putin. The Washington Post reminds us this morning

that when Navalny was first poisoned by Putin, that was in 2000, while Trump was president, Trump was asked by Navalny to denounce the poisoning, and he did not.

Asked by others, Trump deflected, saying instead things like we should focus on China.

Now Trump is again saying nothing bad about Putin. Instead,

he's comparing himself to Navalny, saying the Biden administration is out to imprison him.

Never mind that Trump is facing criminal charges for actual alleged crimes brought by grand juries

of his peers, most not even in federal court.

Navalny was poisoned, imprisoned, and now apparently murdered for expressing his views.

And more than 400, this is just breaking, 400 new arrests are being reported in Russia

over the last day of people simply out at vigils for

Navalny. Donald Trump is not condemning those arrests. His rival for the Republican

presidential nomination, Nikki Haley, said this over the weekend on CNN about Trump's

silence regarding Putin.

The problem is anybody that can't call out a dictator,

that's a problem. You know, he should be calling, not just calling Putin out for what happened

to Noveni. He should be calling Putin out for the fact that he's got Evan Gersovich as a hostage.

He should be calling Putin out for invading Ukraine. He should be calling Putin out for the

fact that now they are surrounding the Baltics and Putin's getting ready for his next act.

Never mind that she mispronounced Navalny as Nalvaney. We'll forgive her that. Nikki Haley on CNN.

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