WASHINGTON — President Trump initiated phone conversations Wednesday with both Russian President Vladimir Putin and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy aimed at ending the ongoing war “immediately.”
“The administration is wholeheartedly committed to a peace deal,” White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt told reporters after the phone calls.
Trump’s back-to-back conversations with Putin and Zelenskyy marked his first major diplomatic overture with the two nations that have been locked in war for three years.
Also on Wednesday, Putin rejected Zelenskyy’s offer to swap territory in peace negotiations.
Vice President J.D. Vance and Secretary of State Marco Rubio planned to lead peace-making negotiations on Friday while meeting with Zelenskyy in Munich.
“The conversation went very well. He, like President Putin, wants to make peace,” Trump wrote in a statement about his conversation with Zelenskyy.
In a Wednesday meeting in Brussels with other nations supporting Ukraine, Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth said a return to Ukraine’s pre-2014 borders is “an unrealistic objective.”
“The United States does not believe that NATO membership for Ukraine is a realistic outcome of a negotiated settlement,” Hegseth said.
When asked about Trump’s stance on Ukraine joining Russia, Leavitt said, “I have not talked to President Trump about Ukraine’s NATO membership,” but she also cautioned against discrediting Hegseth’s statement.
Both Hegseth and Trump have called on European nations to increase financial and military support for NATO, but when asked if any European nations were involved in peace negotiations, Leavitt did not name any.
Trump tied a possible resolution to the crisis in Ukraine with the release by Russia of American history teacher Marc Fogel, who returned to the U.S. Tuesday night. Former President Joe Biden deemed him wrongfully detained after Russia arrested him in August 2021 for possession of marajuana. Trump said Putin’s release of Fogel may be “a big, important part in getting the war over” but did not disclose the terms of Fogel’s return.
Leavitt also noted that Fogel’s mother, Malphine Fogel, was slated to speak at Trump’s July 13 rally in Pennsylvania, during which the President was nearly assassinated.
“I believe this nation views Putin and Russia as a great competitor in the region, at times an adversary,” Leavitt said. “But as the President has said as well, he enjoys having good diplomatic relationships with leaders around the world, finding that common ground, also calling them out when they are wrong.”