Deputy White House press secretary Andrew Bates called former president Donald Trump and Russian President Vladimir Putin “nauseating, fearful pigs what America stands for”.
Mr Bates’ broadside in a tweet posted on Thursday, came as he shared a HuffPost article that featured quotes from a speech Mr Trump gave on Tuesday night, at Mar-a-Lago praising the Russian leader as “pretty smart” for “taking over a country for $2 worth of sanctions.”
“He’s taking over a country, really a vast, vast location, a great piece of land with a lot of people, just walking right in,” Mr Trump said.
The former president’s comments came as Russia began a full-scale military assault on Ukraine that has already left scores of people dead and countless more fearing for their safety in what is already one of the biggest military conflicts in Europe since the end of the second World War.
Reports this afternoon suggest that Russian forces are preparing to try to capture the Ukrainian capital of Kyiv and have already today captured the nearby Chernobyl area after heavy fighting.
Mr Trump has a history of praising authoritarian leaders, including Rodrigo Duterte of the Philippines, and Kim Jong Un of North Korea, but he has long seemed particularly fond of Mr Putin — whose government’s meddling in the 2016 presidential election was intended to boost Mr Trump’s electoral chances.
This most recent praise, of a military action roundly condemned by the United States and its western allies, rankled Mr Bates.
The Biden administration Thursday morning announced a package of new sanctions intended to punish Russia for the attack on its neighboring state, while making clear that he did not intend to involve American troops in the conflict.
“Putin chose this war, and now he and his country will bear the consequences,” Mr Biden said.