The Trump White House’s bold experiment in broadening the press pool is commendable, yet without rigorous scrutiny of those wielding the microphone, it risks amplifying the very aggressors it aims to outmaneuver.
On October 22, 2025, during a joint appearance with President Trump in Washington, NATO Secretary General Mark Rutte faced a pointed question from “anti-war” ZeroHedge correspondent Liam Cosgrove. Cosgrove, who has a history bashing America, Ukraine and Israel, came to the White House with a clear agenda. While it is welcome news that the Trump administration has expanded the role of independent journalists, activists like Liam Cosgrove are not operating in good faith.
During the exchange with Rutte, Cosgrove cited a Gallup poll showing 23% Ukrainian support for “fighting until victory” to argue against continued arms aid:
“You’re obviously lobbying for more NATO weapons to be sent to Ukraine, but Ukrainians themselves don’t want to fight the war. So how do you justify that morally?”
He added: “The war hasn’t wound down. Why do you think that’ll wind down now? You think more weapons will wind down the war?”
Rutte replied that his focus is ending the war through U.S.-led dialogue with Putin and Zelenskyy, including Trump’s proposed ceasefire freeze. He highlighted ally-funded purchases of U.S. systems like Patriot interceptors to protect Ukrainian cities from Russian attacks, including one that day wounding children in a kindergarten.
Here are some images from the Russian attack on a kindergarten on the same day Liam Cosgrove confronted Rutte:
In addition to the attack on the kindergarten, Antonina Nehoda, her 6-month-old daughter Adelina, and 12-year old niece Anastasiia were also murdered on the same day.
Poll Misrepresentation and Public Backlash
Cosgrove’s question misrepresented the August Gallup poll, which shows 69% of Ukrainians favoring negotiations “as soon as possible,” reflecting war fatigue but support for talks with leverage. KIIS data further indicates 76% reject Russian demands like territorial concessions or NATO renunciation. A pro-Ukraine X user called the framing a “slap in the face to those fighting for survival,” emphasizing weapons as a “lifeline against Russian aggression.” Naturally, Russian state media propaganda outlet RT amplified a clip of the exchange, portraying Rutte as evasive.
At the time of this writing, Cosgrove’s X post on the event received over 5,500 likes and 1,500 reposts.
ZeroHedge’s Shadowy Bedfellows
This incident highlights concerns about opening the White House doors to activist journalists. Zerohedge, founded by Bulgarian-born Daniel Ivandjiiski, has, for example, published hundreds of articles from Pepe Escobar (see image of Escobar with Aleksandr Dugin) and others from the Moscow-based Strategic Culture Foundation (SFC). Yuri Prokofiev, Moscow Party Chief from 1989 to 1991 and a Soviet Politburo Member, was SCF’s president until 2015.
A screenshot of the Strategic Culture Foundation homepage laments “Israeli War Crimes and Genocide”, the “Historic Failing of Western Imperialism and Criminality” and praises Putin for calling for a “Peaceful World”. Why would Zerohedge publish hundreds of articles from an obvious anti-American, anti-Israel, anti-Ukraine, anti-West publication?
The Trump White House’s bold experiment in broadening the press pool is commendable, yet without rigorous scrutiny of those wielding the microphone, it risks amplifying the very aggressors it aims to outmaneuver.
The now-defunct U.S. State Department’s Global Engagement Center described the organization as “directed by Russia’s Foreign Intelligence Service (SVR) and affiliated with the Russian Ministry of Foreign Affairs.” Further, the report states: “One of its core tactics is to publish Western fringe thinkers and conspiracy theorists, giving them a broader platform, while trying to obscure the Russian origins of the journal.”
Ivandjiiski’s father, Krassimir Ivandjiiski, joined the Soviet front International Organization of Journalists in 1974. After a 2016 Business Insider report identified Ivandjiiski as a founder – based on former reporter Colin Lokey – ZeroHedge dismissed the claims as part of attacks labeling it a “Russian information operation.” The site emphasized its financial independence since inception and described Lokey as an “emotionally unstable, psychologically troubled alcoholic with a drug dealer past.”
Cosgrove’s Elevated Access in U.S. Briefings
The subversive “journalist” Liam Cosgrove’s platform extends to other official U.S. settings. On May 19, 2025, Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt granted him a “new media” seat and the first question in a White House briefing. He praised Trump’s “peace moves” with Putin, criticized Biden for not engaging Moscow during what he called a “proxy war,” and called for ending U.S. financing of conflicts in Ukraine and Gaza.
But Liam Cosgrove was also allowed access during the Biden years when he was writing for The Grayzone, Max Blumenthal‘s pro-Russia, anti-Israel propagnda outlet.
In October, 2024, Liam Cosgrove confronted then-US Department of State Spokesperson Matthew Miller about United States support for Ukraine. He further lambasted the administration for not negotiating with Iran and Russia and financing what he referred to as a “genocide” in Gaza, questioning the administration’s moral authority.
“So my question for you is: you know, we often hear in response to these concerns that, well, Putin, Xi—you know, they’re war criminals, they’re terrorists,” Cosgrove said, – “as if they’re too inherently evil or immoral for us to negotiate with. But meanwhile, this administration has financed a genocide in Gaza for the last year, and every day you’re up there denying accountability for it. So I mean, what gives you the right to lecture other countries on their morals?
After Miller dismissed Cosgrove by saying: “If you want to give a speech, there are places in Washington where you can give a speech,” Cosgrove retorted:
“Yeah, but people are sick of the sh*t in here. I mean, like, it is a genocide, and you are risking nuclear war in Ukraine [and] plenty of other places.”
Watch the exchange here:
Connections to Pro-Russian Advocacy Networks
Cosgrove’s views align with a network of far-left, anti-imperialist groups that echo Russian positions on Ukraine, often framed through a lens of communist or socialist ideology critical of Western capitalism and NATO. These affiliations position him within circles that prioritize Moscow’s “security concerns” over Ukrainian sovereignty, blending anti-war rhetoric with historical Soviet sympathies.
A key example is his October 2023 discussion with Nick Cruse, co-founder of the Revolutionary Blackout Network (RBN)—a self-described “anti-imperialist, anti-racist, anti-capitalist, anti-war” collective that promotes socialist political education, with a focus on issues affecting black Americans and solidarity with communist parties worldwide.
Cruse, who operates under the handle “Socialist MMA,” hosted Cosgrove for a video chat shortly after a Pentagon briefing. Cosgrove declared the “Ukraine war is insane,” insisting that residents of Crimea and Donbas “want [to] secede from Ukraine [and become a part of the Russian Federation]” and that “we should just let them secede.”
He drew a false equivalence to U.S. policy on Taiwan: “Our official policy on Taiwan is the One China policy but you hear politicians talk about how you know like we can never let China take Taiwan… So for some reason we’re for secession in that case and [we’re] against secession in the case of Crimea and the Donbas.”
Cosgrove further argued that the U.S. “should have allied with them [Russia] and prevented this war… We helped create ISIS,” and decried sanctions as counterproductive, isolating America from “cheap goods from China” and exposing hypocrisies like oil trade with Saudi Arabia.
He blamed U.S. policy on “deep-seated Russophobia,” a term Cruse echoed as tricking “Progressive liberals into cheering for war.” The pair advocated cultural exchange and trade over confrontation, with Cosgrove suggesting that to “make China less authoritarian,” the U.S. should “keep trading with them… lead by example.”
During the talk, Cruse referenced a 2019 Workers World article by Sara Flounders titled “U.S. war on the defenseless / Sanctions harm one-third of world’s people,” sourced from the SanctionsKill Campaign.
Workers World, published by the Marxist-Leninist Workers World Party (WWP) – a communist organization founded in 1959 as a pro-China split from the Socialist Workers Party – has consistently framed Russia’s Ukraine invasion as a U.S./NATO “proxy war.”
Connection to the Communist Party of Britain’s Stop the War Coalition
Cosgrove signed a February 18, 2022, Stop the War Coalition (STWC) statement on Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. The STWC, co-founded in 2001 by Andrew Murray (a Communist Party of Britain executive) to oppose the Iraq War, is led by members of the Communist Party of Britain (CPB) and Counterfire – a Trotskyist split from the Socialist Workers Party. The statement says in part:
Britain needs to change its policy, and start working for peace, not confrontation.
Stop the War believes that Russia and Ukraine should reach a diplomatic settlement of the tensions between them, on the basis of the Minsk-2 agreement already signed by both states.
It believes NATO should call a halt to its eastward expansion and commit to a new security deal for Europe which meets the needs of all states and peoples.
The Trump White House’s bold experiment in broadening the press pool is commendable, yet without rigorous scrutiny of those wielding the microphone, it risks amplifying the very aggressors it aims to outmaneuver. In the end, true peace for Ukraine demands not just more weapons or talks, but a media ecosystem fierce enough to expose the saboteurs in our midst – lest good intentions pave the road to Moscow’s victory.
