One theory I heard is that Tucker was auditioning for Trump’s VP pick, which is not a contradiction at all among certain factions of the CIA.

If he had somehow managed to get very positive responses from Putin, he could leverage that to boost his credentials as a “serious candidate” and reinforce Trump’s platform on the Ukraine war. Although I don’t know if Trump’s ego would allow that.

Either way Putin clearly didn’t give him the win he was looking for at all lol.

(I still think the main reason the Republicans are so opposed to the Ukraine war is because they don’t have the money laundering fronts set up in Ukraine like the Democrats do, so they are seething at the Democrats blatantly transferring billions of dollars there and benefiting from it)