Fox News' Chris Wallace cautions that Kim Jong Un 'has given up nothing at this point'

(Image credit: Pool/Getty Images)

published 12 June 2018

The summit in Singapore between President Trump and North Korean leader Kim Jong Un appears to be going smoothly, but Fox News host Chris Wallace says that "optimism and caution are both warranted in this case."

On Monday night's The Ingraham Angle, Wallace said that it's "almost surreal" to see Trump and Kim, "who just months ago were launching verbal ICBMs at each other," standing together and shaking hands. It's "stunning" and "not to be minimized in any way," but it's also important to remember that "Kim Jong Un has given up nothing at this point. He has not given up a single nuclear bomb, he's not given up a single ICBM, he's not given up any of his nuclear infrastructure. Yes, kind words, yes, they're meeting ... [but] North Korea has made deals before, obviously with different presidents, and has backed off on all of them and reneged on all of them."

Looking back at Ronald Reagan and Mikhail Gorbachev's meetings, "it's easy now" to say they were going to end the Cold War, "but that was not at all clear after the first summit and especially after the second in Reykjavik." As it stands now, "there have been no actions taken by North Korea in terms of denuclearizing," he reminded the audience, "and as they used to say in the Reagan years, the devil is in the details."

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Catherine Garcia has worked as a senior writer at The Week since 2014. Her writing and reporting have appeared in Entertainment Weekly, The New York Times, Wirecutter, NBC News and "The Book of Jezebel," among others. She's a graduate of the University of Redlands and the Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism.

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