AMNA NAWAZ: From visits with heads of states to further restrictions on the press corps, we now turn to the analysis of Brooks and Capehart.

That is New York Times columnist David Brooks, and Jonathan Capehart, associate editor for The Washington Post.

Great to see you both.

JONATHAN CAPEHART: Hey, Amna.

AMNA NAWAZ: So you were both watching, of course, everything at the White House today in the meeting between Presidents Trump and Zelenskyy.

We have talked about it a lot today, but I do want to play for you a little bit of the interview we know President Zelenskyy gave soon after that meeting.

He sat down with FOX News and Bret Baier, and Baier asked him if Zelenskyy thought that the public spat there served Ukraine in any way.

Here's what Zelenskyy said.

VOLODYMYR ZELENSKYY, Ukrainian President: I mean, this is not good for both sides anyway.

And I will -- I will -- very open, but I can't change our Ukrainian attitude to Russian.

And I don't want -- they are killers, for us.

This is very, very clear that Americans are the best of our friends.

Europeans are the best of our friends.

And Putin, with Russian, they are enemies.

And it doesn't mean that we don't want peace.

We just want to recognize the reality.

AMNA NAWAZ: Jonathan, what did you think when you were watching this unfold in the White House and what do you make of the way Zelenskyy is talking about it now?

JONATHAN CAPEHART: I thought the low point for America on the world stage was the Trump-Putin press conference in Helsinki in 2017, when the president of the United States sided with the president of Russia against his own national intelligence apparatus.

What we saw in the Oval Office was a travesty, horrendous, despicable.

I -- there aren't any words to describe what we watched, where we saw a vice president who's never been to Ukraine lecture a wartime president who was clearly summoned to the White House to humiliate him on the world stage either on behalf of or for the benefit of Vladimir Putin in Russia.

And, look, I give President Zelenskyy major points for standing up for himself, for standing up for his nation and standing up for his people.

He is in there fighting for America's backing, which, I'm sorry, it should not even be in doubt, given the stakes that are involved and who he is trying to protect his people from.

AMNA NAWAZ: David, from that Helsinki meeting in 2018 to this meeting today, what do you make of it?

DAVID BROOKS: I will stick with today.

(LAUGHTER) DAVID BROOKS: I have enough to say about today.

I was nauseated, just nauseated.

All my life, I have had a certain idea of about America, that we're a flawed country, but we're fundamentally a force for good in the world, that we defeated Soviet Union, we defeated fascism, we did the Marshall Plan, we did PEPFAR to help people live in Africa.

And we make mistakes, Iraq, Vietnam, but they're usually mistakes out of stupidity, naivete and arrogance.

They're not because we're ill-intentioned.

What I have seen over the last six weeks is the United States behaving vilely, vilely to our friends in Canada and Mexico, vilely to our friends in Europe.

And today was the bottom of the barrel, vilely to a man who is defending Western values, at great personal risk to him and his countrymen.

Donald Trump believes in one thing.

He believes that might makes right.

And, in that, he agrees with Vladimir Putin that they are birds of a feather.

And he and Vladimir Putin together are trying to create a world that's safe for gangsters, where ruthless people can thrive.

And we saw the product of that effort today in the Oval Office.

And I have -- I first started thinking, is it -- am I feeling grief?

Am I feeling shock, like I'm in a hallucination?

But I just think shame, moral shame.

It's a moral injury to see the country you love behave in this way.

AMNA NAWAZ: You heard Congressman Lawler, who would not criticize the president necessarily, but is a Ukraine supporter, say, we're further away from a deal, they have to get back to a deal, the war has to end.

You also heard Nick Schifrin report earlier, his European sources are saying there's a fundamental transatlantic break now.

Is this the realignment, Jonathan?

Has this happened?

The U.S. is now closer to Russia than to its European allies?

JONATHAN CAPEHART: Undisputed.

Yes.

Yes.

And the fact that the Europeans are already looking at it as a break, I think they have to do that.

They can't depend on the United States now.

After what happened to President Zelenskyy in the Oval Office, what happens to the Baltic states, what happens to Estonia if Russia rolls over the border?

What happens to Poland if Russia rolls over the border?

What happens if any of the NATO countries are attacked by Russia after what we just saw?

They cannot depend on the United States anymore, after more than seven decades.

I'm sure the Europeans are probably even more in shock than we are at this table.

And I'm glad you used the word gangster, because that was the thing.

When the - - when President Trump got into it with President Zelenskyy, you don't have any cards.

Without us, you have no deal.

It -- that was gangster rule there.

And between him and the vice president, it also felt like watching a wrestling match, where Vance jumps in the ring and then taps in the president, and then they gang up on a man who is literally fighting for the survival of his country.

AMNA NAWAZ: David, is there a way to get any kind of deal back on track?

Is there a way to repair what was clearly broken today?

DAVID BROOKS: Yes, I think so.

I mean, Trump is transactional.

He will bash people.

He will hate people.

And then he will do a deal.

We have seen that in the past.

I just wonder where his values are.

If he -- he clearly has a thing for Vladimir Putin.

We have seen that for eight years.

And he's not going to lean on Putin.

He's going to side with Putin, as Timothy Snyder said today.

And so maybe that's just his belief system.

And J.D.

Vance has a value system, which is a belief in performance art.

What he did was not the act of someone who is a diplomat.

It was not the act of someone who's a statesman.

It was not the act of someone who has the faintest hint of responsibility to edge on his president, to just try to do a mano a mano against a man who's 10 times the man he is, frankly.

So there's a lot to overcome.

But I do think it's got to be in America's interest not to let Vladimir Putin take over Ukraine.

Surely everybody sees that.

And so I have some hope there will still be a possibility for a deal somehow.

AMNA NAWAZ: We did hear in that exchange at the end, President Trump, as it was sort of coming to a close, he said, well, this is going to be great television, sort of acknowledge this has all unfolded on live television for the entire world to see.

And, for better or worse, this is a president who really understands the power of the media and how to harness it and how to leverage it.

And I know we have talked about some of the changes before.

He's continued attacks on the press, blocking the AP's access from some White House coverage as well.

You saw him take control, the White House take control of the press pool that covers the president full time, makes sure everyone else knows what's happening with the president.

Peter Baker, of course, longtime Russia correspondent, said it reminded him of the Kremlin press pool takeover.

And I just want to get your takes on where that sort of attack on the press stands and whether we're in much more sinister territory now.

JONATHAN CAPEHART: I do think we are in more sinister territory because you have got to look at what's happening with AP, in light of his lawsuits against CBS, against ABC, threats, threatening the licenses of other broadcast entities.

This is all part of a pattern of roughing up anyone he views as not either insufficiently loyal or people who have wronged him.

And he looks at the press as an entity that has wronged him.

But what I would say is, it's sort of inside baseball that AP is not allowed in the pool, which means it can't get into all these places.

To me, it just says that the White House press corps, which already does hard work, they're just going to have to work a little bit harder reporting on an administration that already leaks like a sieve.

AMNA NAWAZ: David?

DAVID BROOKS: Yes, I mean, Donald Trump does everything he can to destroy things that would restrain his power.

And so that's the attorney generals he fires.

That's the inspector generals.

That's the JAG officers.

That's the leadership of the military who doesn't like.

And the press is a potential restraint on his power.

And so he is trying to dismantle the idea of the press.

And if I could bash the press a little, or at least the owner of Jonathan's newspaper, we're helping.

Jeff Bezos, when he says, not going to -- we're going to have an opinion section in The Washington Post that does not brook dissent, that's just not journalism.

And I have seen this again from entrepreneurs who say, why would you publish something you disagree with?

They just don't get it, some people.

That's what we do.

That's what democracy is.

Your loyalty to democracy is higher than your loyalty to one ideology or another.

And so the idea that we're not -- we have a major newspaper that doesn't publish dissent, that can't be.

AMNA NAWAZ: David Brooks, Jonathan Capehart, thank you both for being here, for engaging always.

We appreciate you.

JONATHAN CAPEHART: Thanks, Amna.