Did speaking English as a second language impact Zelensky in THAT meeting with Trump?

Much has been said about the catastrophic meeting at the White House last Friday between Ukrainian President Zelensky and the US President and Vice President. Did tempers flare and the whole thing get out of hand unnecessarily? Did the verbal clash simply expose the underlying fault lines between the two sides? Or was it a planned ambush, purposefully displayed before the world’s TV cameras? They’ve been called the 10 minutes that will change the course of the war in Ukraine. Whether that’s true or not, it was, as President Trump said ‘great TV’ (as a TV person that makes me wince a little, but I see the point) that will be dissected for years to come.

But there’s an angle that I think has been overlooked in much of the commentary: the fact that Volodymyr Zelensky was speaking in his second language. In fact, English may technically not even be his second but actually his third language (he is fluent in Russian and Ukranian). The point is, he’s definitely not a native English speaker, and even though he is fluent, his grammar is often flawed and you can tell he sometimes can’t find the right words.

I don’t, of course, mean this as criticism. I’m guessing Zelensky has been too busy over the past three years to work on his IELTS (International English Language Testing System) qualifications with some elocution lessons thrown in for good measure.

But the way he speaks English may well have had an impact on the disastrous turn of the Trump/Vance conversation. In the clip that I’ve isolated above, you can see the moments when it all went horrifically wrong. JD Vance had already been accusing Zelensky of ‘bringing people on propaganda tours’ and asking whether Ukraine was having problems with recruitment, while Trump looked on impassively. But it’s this phrase from Zelensky that triggers an exchange with President Trump.

“During war, everyone has problems. Even you, but you have nice ocean and don’t feel now, but you will feel in the future…. God Bless…..”

Trump interrupts: “Don’t tell us what we’re going to feel. You’re in no position to dictate what we’re going to feel.”

Then Trump continues: “You’re not in a good position. You don’t have the cards right now….”

“I’m not playing cards….” replies Zelensky.

Many of the seeds of discord had been sown earlier in the meeting, including around the issue of Zelensky’s attire, with Donald Trump himself pointing out that the Ukranian Presindent hadn’t dressed up for the occasion, while Zelensky wears the usual simple black outfit that he feels is suitable for the leader of a country at war. And that’s a key issue, because at the start of this explosive exchange, Zelensky is trying to explain to Trump what being a country at war is like and about how, ultimately, geography is your greatest asset against an enemy. A literal ocean between you and a potential aggressor will make you less vulnerable, but not immune. That is obviously what Zelensky was trying to say, but not what he actually verbalised. The word ‘feel’ implies an emotive reaction from the United States rather than a geographical fact, and also includes a prediction that Russia will attack the United States, something that sparked Trump’s ire. The US President obviously feels (and has said) that Russian President Vladimir Putin ‘respects him’. An attack from Russia would dispel that theory.

Then there’s the whole issue around ‘having the cards’ which seems to have become President Trump’s favourite idiom over the past few days. It’s quite a common phrase which does translate into various languages, but for Zelensky it’s the reference to a game that rankles. “I’m not playing cards…” he says.

(Addendum) As Heather and Luke, subscribers to this newsletter, have pointed out in the comments below, there was also an issue around the words ‘suit’ and ‘dictate’. When Zelensky was asked why he hadn’t worn a suit, Zelensky replies that he’ll “wear a costume after the war.” The Ukranian word for suit is a variant of costume. So Zelensky may simply have been using what is called a false-friend: words that have similar roots but different meanings or connotations in different language. In fairness, using the English word costume in that exchange could be taken as contemptuous. A similar issue cropped up around the word ‘dictate’. When Trump tells Zelensky that he can’t dictate the terms, the Ukrainian President replies “I’m not a dictator”. Not an unreasonable statement considering Trump had actually called him a dictator just a few days earlier, but still a misunderstanding of what Trump meant when using the word ‘dictate’.

Regular readers of this newsletter will know that I strongly believe language is culture. To truly speak a language, you need to understand the culture that language comes from. Even leaving aside the fact that Zelensky is president of a country at war who has witnessed the death of thousands of his countrymen and women and is now being asked why he’s not wearing a suit, the way Ukranians express themselves may sometimes seem abrupt or even brusque to American interlocutors. I’m very wary of falling into a stereotypical way of looking at nations here, but I’ve spent 16 years working for an international news channel and know that people do behave differently depending on which part of the world they come from. In an interview setting, for example, different cultures view confrontation in different ways. If you’ve truly had to communicate and work with people from different cultures, you’ll know this to be, generally speaking, true - though of course there are exceptions.

Why didn’t the Ukrainian President use a translator, some people have asked? Only Zelensky and his team know the answer to that questions, but my years in TV have taught me that speaking with translation is always a barrier for viewers. If at all possible, TV networks always ask guests to speak in English if their language skills allow. It flows better and is better for ratings. Zelensky knew he also had to convince the American audience watching the meeting live from the White House that Ukraine is worth defending, that Ukrainians are fighting for their freedom much like Americans would. Having a translator there would be, for want of a better word, othering. Knowing how the exchange went, it might have been a price worth paying. Hindsight is a fine thing.

And this leads us to the final point, which is that Zelensky speaking English as a second language in that meeting cannot be compared to anglophones who are fluent in another language having to assert themselves in whatever that language is.

That’s because English is the global language.

It’s the dominant language, the privileged language.

All of us non-native English speakers know that using the right words is only half the battle. Just as important to the effectiveness of our communication is how you adapt to the culture of the anglophone world: whether it’s sense of humour, cultural references, level of so-called political correctness, different attitudes to deference, or being direct but also cordial. These are some of the countless rules you won’t find in a grammar book but that will make the difference when you have to hold your own in a conversation with native English speakers, especially when done in public and live.

Neither Trump nor Vance seem to be making any allowances for the fact that Zelensky is speaking in a language that’s not his mother tongue. And why would they? They’re speaking the global language. It’s for others to adapt. The vice president kept using the word ‘litigate’. There are plenty of native English speakers who wouldn’t know the exact meaning of that word, and it wouldn’t be patronising to assume a second-language speaker doesn’t.

Compare and contrast the total debacle we saw on Friday with the meeting between Donald Trump and British Prime Minister Sir Kier Starmer. It happened a mere 24 hours before but frankly it feels like it took place in another universe. It had all gone so well, you could almost feel the whole of the United Kingdom collectively heave a sigh of relief that it hadn’t descended into some kind of ritual humiliation. Obviously there are different dynamics: although it’s hard these days to speak of the ‘special relationship’ between the UK and US with a straight face, the two countries are historic allies and cultural cousins. Trump seems not to have taken against Starmer despite the obvious differences between them, and a letter from King Charles is always a great ice breaker. And then, of course, there’s the accent, an Englishman’s not-so-secret weapon with foreigners.

After having ‘complimented’ an Afghan journalist a few weeks ago about her beautiful but, alas, incomprehensible accent, Donald Trump highlighted the beauty of Stamer’s accent during their press conference at the White House last Thursday. Listen to the exchange below.

So where speech was a disadvantage for one leader meeting Trump, it was an advantage for another. Perhaps comparing the two meetings is unfair. There are massive divisions at play and it would be facile to reduce the Zelensky/Trump disaster to a case of ‘lost in translation’. It wasn’t. Both sides meant what they said. But if you are a second-language English speaker preparing for a tricky confrontation, always beware the additional languistic traps, especially with live TV cameras rolling.