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While facing Zelensky, Real Estate mogul Steve Witkoff told the world that eastern Ukraine belongs to Russia by fair elections

DW PHILLIPS

OCT 20, 2025

It was a surreal moment in the history of recent diplomacy and window into the Kremlin puppetry taking place at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue

Was It Merely Galactic Ignorance?

No one ever voted for this man. The Senate never confirmed him to any position—let alone one of the most consequential foreign policy roles in the world today.

And yet, for the past ten months, there he was: Steve Witkoff, real estate billionaire turned de facto diplomat, representing the White House on the defining geopolitical conflict of our generation.

America’s Special Envoy to the Kremlin—perhaps the most unqualified, manipulable, and uninformed individual to carry the mantle of U.S. diplomacy in modern history.

The last time Witkoff made headlines as a U.S. envoy, it was for using a trained Russian spy as his translator in a private meeting with Vladimir Putin. The incident was more than a shocking breach of diplomatic protocol—it raised urgent questions about U.S. national security. And now, those questions have only grown louder.

Because on Friday, October [X], Envoy Witkoff sat across from Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky in the Oval Office, not to listen or learn, but to instruct—to lecture a wartime president on the history of his own country.

And in doing so, he repeated—directly to Zelensky’s face—a core tenet of Russian propaganda.

“I don’t mean to be controversial,” Witkoff began,
“but eastern Ukraine was really part of Russia… They voted for it.”

Let that statement sink in.

In the seat of American power, under the presidential seal, a man with no diplomatic experience and no mandate spoke on behalf of the United States—validating a Kremlin lie used to justify the invasion, annexation, and slaughter of a sovereign nation.

Witkoff’s words were more than misguided. They were historically illiterate and morally blind. And they echoed a strategy used by authoritarian regimes for nearly a century: invade, intimidate, stage a vote, and claim legitimacy.

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A History of Forced Votes and Fabricated Consent

What Russia has done in Ukraine, first in Crimea (2014), and again in Donetsk, Luhansk, Zaporizhzhia, and Kherson (2022), is not new. It’s the repetition of an old playbook:

• In 1938, Nazi Germany marched into Austria and held a referendum under military occupation. It claimed 99.7% voted to join the Reich. But the vote was conducted under duress, with Nazi propaganda flooding the streets and no real opposition. Austrians voted with Hitler or faced potentially terminal consequences. The world saw it for what it was: a farce.
• In 1940, the Soviet Union invaded and occupied the Baltic states. It installed puppet governments and held fake elections to justify annexation. Those votes were later rejected by the West, and the Baltics spent five decades under Soviet rule until they regained their independence.
• And in modern Ukraine, Russia has staged “referendums” under military occupation, with reports of coercion, voter intimidation, and ballot-stuffing. The 2022 votes in the occupied east were conducted as missiles rained down, and many ballots were pre-marked. Residents voted under the watch of armed soldiers knowing the consequences of their votes. 

These are not democratic processes. They are staged performances, designed to manufacture the appearance of consent for conquest.

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The World’s Response: Universal Rejection

The United States and the international community overwhelmingly condemned these sham referendums as illegitimate:

• The United Nations General Assembly, in Resolution ES-11/4, declared that Russia’s attempted annexations “have no validity under international law.”
• The United States, European Union, NATO, the G7, and even traditionally neutral countries like Switzerland and Japan have categorically rejected these votes and refused to recognize the territories as part of Russia.
• The Biden administration has consistently stated that no territory taken by force can be legitimized by a fake vote.

Calling these rigged plebiscites “elections” is like calling a hostage video a voluntary confession. 

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Zelensky, Master of Self Control

When Witkoff made his statement, there was a brief moment of discomfort. Cameras were rolling. The room held its breath. 

But President Zelensky, responded not with outrage, but calm resolve and a respect.

“The people of Donetsk and Luhansk didn’t vote to be invaded,” he said quietly.
“They voted in 1991, with all Ukrainians, for independence. Russia promised to respect that. And then it broke that promise with tanks and bombs.”

Simple. Accurate. Self controlled. Clear. 

The truth, in moments like this, is its own rebuke.

Real democracy doesn’t happen under occupation. Real consent isn’t forged by the forced occupation of a merciless army which murders children and the elderly for sport. 

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DW Phillips is a filmmaker, journalist and constitutional attorney who directs for Ukraine Story. He is executive producer for Kyiv of Mine.