MIAMI – President Donald Trump warned Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy on Wednesday that he “better move fast” to negotiate an end to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine or risk losing his country.
Trump’s rhetoric toward Ukraine comes amid an escalating back-and-forth between the two presidents, as well as rising tensions between Washington and much of Europe over Trump’s approach to resolving the continent’s largest conflict since WWII.
Trump’s harsh words for Zelenskyy drew criticism from Democrats and even some Republicans in the United States, where Ukraine’s defense against Russian aggression enjoys bipartisan support. Zelenskyy claimed Trump was falling into a Russian disinformation trap, but was quickly warned by Vice President JD Vance about the dangers of publicly criticizing the new president.
Trump, who is attempting to end the fighting on terms that Kyiv claims are too favorable to Moscow, used an extended social media post on his Truth Social platform to lash out at Zelenskyy, calling the Ukrainian a “dictator without elections.”
“Think of it, a modestly successful comedian, Volodymyr Zelenskyy, talked the United States of America into spending $350 billion dollars to go into a war that could not be won, that never had to start, but a war that he, without the U.S. and ‘TRUMP,’ will never be able to settle,” Trump said of Zelenskyy, who was a popular television star in Ukraine before running for president.
AP According to Washington correspondent Sagar Meghani, President Trump and Ukraine’s Volodymyr Zelenskyy are trading barbs as their relations deteriorate due to the Russia war.
The US has obligated approximately $183 billion since Russia invaded Ukraine in February 2022, according to the US special inspector general, who is in charge of overseeing American assistance to Ukraine.
Trump accused Zelenskyy of being “a dictator without elections!!” Ukraine’s scheduled elections for April 2024 were postponed due to the war.
During an address before a meeting of business executives hosted by Saudi Arabia’s sovereign wealth fund in Miami, he repeated many of his criticisms of Zelenskyy, whom he called “terrible.”
Trump also claimed that Zelenskyy abused American aid intended for the war effort and took advantage of Democrat Joe Biden’s administration.
The Republican president was enraged by Zelenskyy’s accusation that Trump “lives in this disinformation space” created by Moscow. “We have seen this disinformation. “We understand that it is coming from Russia,” Zelenskyy stated.
Vance told the Daily Mail that Zelenskyy’s criticism of Trump was not helping his case. “The idea that Zelenskyy is going to change the president’s mind by bad mouthing him in public media, everyone who knows the president will tell you that is an atrocious way to deal with this administration,” Vance pointed out.
Ukrainian officials, on the other hand, have continued to express concern about Trump’s approach.
Why should dominance be granted to a country that is an aggressor, a violator of international law, and the perpetrator of aggression against Ukraine?” said Mykhailo Podolyak, Zelenskyy’s adviser. “We still do not understand this strategy.”
Officials from the United States and Russia met in Saudi Arabia on Tuesday and agreed to negotiate a settlement to end the war. Ukrainian and European officials were excluded.
Trump criticized Zelenskyy for failing to reach an agreement sooner. “Zelenskyy better move fast or he is not going to have a Country left,” Mr. Trump stated.
“In the meantime, we are successfully negotiating an end to the war with Russia, which everyone admits only ‘TRUMP,’ and the Trump administration, can do. Trump wrote, “Biden never tried, Europe has failed to bring peace, and Zelenskyy probably wants to keep the ‘gravy train’ going.”
Trump’s rhetoric went beyond the false charges he made against Ukrainians on Tuesday, implying that Kyiv was to blame for starting the war. Russia invaded a smaller neighbor.
Senate Democratic Leader Chuck Schumer of New York was outraged that Trump blamed Ukraine for Russian President Vladimir Putin’s invasion.
“It is disgusting to see an American president turn against one of our friends and openly side with a thug like Vladimir Putin,” Schumer told Fox News.
Sen. John Kennedy, R-La., said he disagreed with Trump’s claim that Ukraine was responsible.
“I think Vladimir Putin started the war,” Kennedy stated. “I also believe, based on bitter experience, that Vladimir Putin is a gangster. “He is a gangster with a black heart” who has Soviet dictator Josef Stalin’s “taste for blood.”
Sen. Dick Durbin, D-Ill., said Trump’s remarks were disrespectful to the thousands of Ukrainians who have died in the conflict, accusing the president of echoing Putin. “I would call on President Trump to apologize to the people of Ukraine, but it would be a waste of breath,” he said. “Donald Trump is a pushover for Putin.”
Senate Majority Leader John Thune of South Dakota is among the Republican lawmakers who have supported Ukraine throughout the war. He stated that the Trump administration required space as it sought a resolution. “The president speaks for himself,” Thune said of Trump’s increasingly aggressive rhetoric toward Zelenskyy. “What I want to see is a peaceful result, a peaceful outcome.”
The administration has also expressed dissatisfaction with Zelenskyy for instructing his ministers last week not to sign off on a proposed agreement granting the United States access to Ukraine’s rare earth minerals. The Ukrainians claimed the document was overly focused on US interests.
The proposal, which was a key part of Zelenskyy’s discussions with Vance on the sidelines of the Munich Security Conference, provided no specific security guarantees in exchange. During his speech in Miami, Trump slammed the Ukrainians for abandoning an agreement. “They broke that deal,” Trump alleged.
Trump, speaking to reporters aboard Air Force One after his speech Wednesday evening, said the US believed it had reached an agreement to access Ukraine’s critical minerals when Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent visited Kyiv last week.
According to Trump, the Ukrainians “agreed to it more or less and then Scott Bessent went there and was treated rather rudely because essentially they told him no.”
Ukrainian officials met with retired US Lt. Gen. Keith Kellogg, President Donald Trump’s special envoy to Ukraine and Russia, on Wednesday in Kyiv.
“It is an egregious war in terms of length of time and casualties, and he understands the human suffering,” Kellogg said of Trump’s perspective. “He understands the damage that we can see and we want to see an end to it.”
