Presidential primary candidate Robert F Kennedy Jr said that he believes Russia acted in "good faith" when it invaded Ukraine, and claimed the US was largely responsible for the war.
Mr Kennedy is running as a Democrat in the 2024 presidential primaries.
He made the comments during an interview on SiriusXM's "The Briefing with Steve Scully," according to the HuffPost.
Scully asked Mr Kennedy about Russian President Vladimir Putin's invasion, which prompted Mr Kennedy to say that "baby steps" towards negotiations were the appropriate path forward.
The interviewer then pointed out that Mr Putin has largely dismissed calls for negotiations unless they allow Russia to keep the land it has already occupied in Ukraine.
“No, no. Putin has repeatedly said yes,” Mr Kennedy said. “In fact, he negotiated — two times he agreed to agreements. He agreed to the Minsk Accord, and then he agreed in 2022 to an agreement that would’ve left Ukraine completely intact.”
He then blamed the US for forcing "[Ukrainian President Volodomyr] Zelensky to sabotage that agreement."
"It was already signed. So you know, the Russians were acting in good faith," he said. "So, no, I think we're the ones who have not been acting in good faith."
The US has repeatedly demanded Mr Putin end his invasion, noting that he could end the war at any time by withdrawing its forces from Ukraine.
It's not the first time Mr Kennedy has shared pro-Russian opinions; he said earlier this week that the war in Ukraine was a "creation of a relentless mentality of foreign domination" in the US. He has also referred to the conflict as a "proxy war."
“I abhor Russia’s brutal and bloody invasion of that nation,” Mr Kennedy told an audience in New Hampshire on Tuesday. “But we must understand that our government has also contributed to its circumstances through repeated deliberate provocations of Russia going back to the 1990s.”
Mr Kennedy has been in the news recently after a controversial appearance on the Joe Rogan podcast during which he made anti-vaccine claims. After Dr Peter Hotez, a vaccine scientist and pediatrician who helps develop low-cost vaccines for countries that can't afford more expensive inoculations, criticised the appearance, Mr Kennedy and Rogan demanded the doctor debate them on the podcast.
Since then right-wing followers of Rogan and Mr Kennedy have hounded and even reportedly stalked Dr Hotez, who refused the debate offer.
Mr Kennedy has chalked up the criticism he has gained for his generally right-wing views as a media conspiracy against him. He was banned on Instagram for sharing vaccine misinformation but was later re-instated after announcing his candidacy.
“There is not a charitable view toward me in the mainstream media. And, you know, the only thing I would say is that I would urge people not to believe the things that they’re reading about me in the mainstream media, but, you know, listen to my own words and not accept the characterizations as necessarily true," he said. "There seems to be an almost frantic need to discredit me, to marginalize me, to vilify me.”
