Here’s what Trump insiders are privately saying about Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy’s cascade of meetings — and what it all means for Ukraine, Russia, Europe and MAGA.
For Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy, Monday began with a diplomatic whirlwind. It ended with a great sigh of relief.
Hours of meetings in Washington — Zelenskyy with President Donald Trump, Trump with a coterie of Europe’s most powerful leaders, all of the above together in the Oval Office — culminated in a “breakthrough,” in the words of NATO Secretary-General Mark Rutte: Trump expressed a willingness to participate in security guarantees for Ukraine.
On the international stage, that alone amounts to a new dawn not only for the relationship between the U.S. and Ukraine, but also Zelenskyy’s relationship with Trump, and America’s with some of its closest transatlantic allies.
On the home front, it could be a bit more complicated. While there are no specifics yet on what exactly U.S. security guarantees might look like for Ukraine — Zelenskyy suggested those would be ironed out within 10 days — even the vague allusion to them hints that MAGA may be careening toward another foreign policy divide.
In public, there are a few topline takeaways from yesterday. The biggest are the security guarantees, and the reality that Zelenskyy and Russian President Vladimir Putin are hurtling toward a bilateral meeting; German Chancellor Friedrich Merz said that summit could happen within the next two weeks. After that, Trump intends to join Zelenskyy and Putin for a trilateral meeting with the aim of ending Russia’s war on Ukraine, he announced on social media. “[T]he optimism of your president is to be taken seriously,” French President Emmanuel Macron told NBC News. “So if he considers he can get a deal done, this is great news, and we have to do whatever we can to have a great deal.”