Adam Kadyrov has been named curator of Chechnya's internal affairs ministry, which oversees counterterrorism and riot control, among other responsibilities.
Chingis Kondarov/REUTERS
Adam Kadyrov, 17, was just appointed to oversee Chechnya's internal affairs ministry.
He's the son of Chechen strongman leader Ramzan Kadyrov, a staunch ally of Vladimir Putin.
The teenager is set to lead a ministry in charge of police, counterterrorism, and local security.
Adam Kadyrov is enjoying a stellar career.
Russian state media reported that the 17-year-old was named curator of Chechnya's internal affairs ministry on Monday, meaning he'll oversee police and local security forces. The ministry also handles counterterrorism and riot control.
A state broadcast showed the teen receiving the appointment at a ceremonial meeting as uniformed officers applauded.
Soon after, he was filmed performing his duties by naming a new head of Chechnya's operational search division and handing out medals to police officers.
The 17-year-old was already appointed overseer of Chechnya's Russian Special Forces University last April. The university says it teaches civilians and soldiers skills such as artillery operations and parachute landing.
The teenager is also the third son of Ramzan Kadyrov, the strongman leader of Russia's predominantly Muslim Chechen Republic.
Russia's human rights authorities voiced concern about the assault, but Kadyrov lauded his son after the clip went viral and said he "did the right thing."
Since then, the teenager has been bestowed with Chechnya's "Hero of the Republic" medal. He's been separately given at least eight other state awards and honors.
Adam Kadyrov and his father are seen here in December 2023 after talks between Russia and the United Arab Emirates.
Contributor/Getty Images
In November 2023, just before turning 16, he was named the head of his father's security detail. For his role, the teenager was entered into Russia's "Book of Records" — the country's version of the Guinness World Records — for being the youngest recorded chief of a security detail.
The accolades and appointments have prompted speculation that the teenager is being groomed to succeed his father amid rumors that Kadyrov may be suffering from poor health. Novaya Gazeta, a Russian independent newspaper, reported in April that the warlord may be battling issues with his kidneys and pancreas.
Kadyrov was not seen at his son's appointment on Monday, but state media said the teenager was given the role under the Chechen leader's orders. State broadcasts showed him meeting with local residents during the Muslim festival of Eid.
Kadyrov's press service did not respond to a request for comment sent by Business Insider.
President Donald Trump is "pissed off" at Russian President Vladimir Putin for lashing out at Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy this weekend, he told NBC News in an interview.
Trump told the outlet that he was frustrated with Putin for not moving in the right direction toward a peace agreement with Ukraine. Putin disparaged Zelenskyy's leadership on Friday, arguing that a trans-national government may be necessary for Ukraine.
"If Russia and I are unable to make a deal on stopping the bloodshed in Ukraine, and if I think it was Russia’s fault — which it might not be — but if I think it was Russia’s fault, I am going to put secondary tariffs on oil, on all oil coming out of Russia," Trump told the outlet.
"That would be that if you buy oil from Russia, you can’t do business in the United States," he continued. "There will be a 25% tariff on all oil, a 25- to 50-point tariff on all oil."
Putin's latest aggression has gone beyond words as well, with his forces engaging in multiple attacks on Ukrainian targets over the weekend.
Four people were killed and 24 were injured Friday evening after Russian drones struck Dnipro in the country’s east, according to regional Gov. Serhii Lysak and Ukraine’s emergency service. At least eight more people were injured when a Russian ballistic missile struck nearby Kryvyi Rih, Zelenskyy’s hometown, Gov. Lysak reported.
A drone attack in Kharkiv on Saturday night also killed two people and injured 35 more.
Putin himself praised the "strategic initiative" of his forces on Thursday.
"Our troops, our guys are moving forward and liberating one territory after another, one settlement after another, every day," he said at a public forum.
Meanwhile, Zelenskyy has urged the U.S. to force Moscow to rein in its aggression.
On Thursday, Zelenskyy met with French President Emmanuel Macron ahead of a summit in Paris of some 30 nations about how to strengthen Kyiv’s hand and its military as it pushes for a ceasefire with Russia. Proposals to deploy European troops in the country in tandem with any peace deal are also being discussed.
Fox News' Michael Dorgan and the Associated Press contributed to this report.
President Donald Trump's envoy to Russia and Ukraine says he doesn't believe Russian President Vladimir Putin wants to invade Europe.
Envoy Steve Witkoff made the statement during a Sunday morning appearance on "Fox News Sunday," commenting on Putin's motives on a "larger scale."
"Now I've been asked my opinion about what President Putin's motives are on a larger scale. And I simply have said that I just don't see that he wants to take all of Europe," Witkoff said.
"This is a much different situation than it was in World War II. There was no NATO," he added. "I take him at his word in this sense."
The comments come just before Witkoff is set to meet with Russian and Ukrainian delegations for indirect ceasefire talks in Saudia Arabia. Trump's administration hopes to mediate a larger peace deal.
"I think you're going to see in Saudi Arabia on Monday some real progress, particularly as it affects a Black Sea ceasefire on ships between both countries. And from that you'll naturally gravitate to a full-on shooting ceasefire," he said Sunday.
Moscow spokesman Dmitry Peskov emphasized that there are many roadblocks that could prevent a peace deal, however.
"We are only at the beginning of this path," he told reporters this weekend.
Russia launched a massive drone attack targeting Kyiv and other major cities in Ukraine overnight on Sunday, highlighting just how far there is to go before a peace agreement can be made.
Ukrainians at the scene of the attacks in Kyiv surveyed the damage done to their homes and neighborhoods on Sunday morning. Many were disparaging of the upcoming ceasefire talks, pointing to the burned-out homes destroyed in the drone attack, saying these were more indicative of Russia’s true intentions.
President Donald Trumpsigned more executive orders this week — including one to upend the Department of Education — battled the judicial branch, and spoke to both Russian President Vladimir Putin and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy.
On Thursday, Trump announced plans to work with Congress to upend the Department of Education. Closing down an agency requires the approval of Congress, according to the U.S. Constitution.
"We're not doing well with the world of education in this country, and we haven't for a long time," Trump said Thursday before signing the executive order.
A White House fact sheet on the executive order said the directive aims to "turn over education to families instead of bureaucracies" and instructs Education Secretary Linda McMahon to "take all necessary steps to facilitate the closure of the Department of Education and return education authority to the States, while continuing to ensure the effective and uninterrupted delivery of services, programs, and benefits on which Americans rely."
Trump said Thursday programs for Pell Grants, student loans for undergraduate students, and others that provide resources for children with special needs would continue to exist, just under different agencies.
"They're going to be preserved in full and redistributed to various other agencies and departments that will take very good care of them," Trump said.
Those in favor of shuttering the agency have pointed to the "Nation’s Report Card," the 2024 National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP) released every two years, released on Jan. 27. The exam tests fourth and eighth grade students and found almost stagnant math scores for eighth graders compared to 2022. Reading scores dropped two points at both grade levels.
As a result, Trump said without evidence that new efforts to upend the Department of Education would allow states like Texas to provide education comparable to countries like Norway, Denmark and Sweden.
"And then you'll have some laggards, and we'll work with them," Trump said. "And we can all tell you who the laggards will be, right now, probably, but let's not get into that."
Here’s also what Trump did this week:
Trump called for the impeachment of Judge James Boasberg of the United States District Court for the District of Columbia in a social media post Tuesday, prompting Supreme Court Chief Justice John Roberts to issue a rare statement condemning Trump’s remarks.
Trump’s pushback stems from Boasberg issuing an order on Saturday halting the Trump administration from deporting migrants allegedly part of the Tren de Aragua gang under the Alien Enemies Act of 1798. The law permits deportation of natives and citizens of an enemy nation without a hearing.
The flights carrying the migrants continued to El Salvador, and White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt said Sunday the order had "no lawful basis" since Boasberg issued it after the flights departed from U.S. airspace.
In response to Boasberg’s order, Trump said the judge should be impeached. However, Roberts said that "it has been established that impeachment is not an appropriate response to disagreement concerning a judicial decision."
Boasberg’s order is one of multiple injunctions issued against the Trump administration, blocking various executive orders he’s signed since taking office in January. The White House has accused judges of behaving as partisan activists to stop Trump’s agenda.
"I would like to point out that the judges in this country are acting erroneously," Leavitt said in a Wednesday news briefing. "We have judges who are acting as partisan activists from the bench."
Trump also announced that Boeing had won out among defense companies for a contract to build the Air Force’s next-generation fighter jet, known as the F-47.
"I’m thrilled to announce that at my direction the United States Air Force is moving forward with the world’s first sixth-generation fighter jet," Trump said Friday in the Oval Office at the White House. "Nothing in the world comes even close to it, and it’ll be called the ‘F-47,’ the generals picked that title."
The Next Generation Air Defense initiative that the Biden administration put on the back burner will oversee the effort. The Trump administration revived the program, a move that Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth said Friday "sends a very direct, clear message to our allies that we're not going anywhere, and to our enemies that we will be able to project power around the globe."
An experimental version of the jet has been covertly flying for "years," according to Trump.
"The F-47 will be the most advanced, most capable, most lethal aircraft ever built," Trump said.
Trump also spoke with both Putin and Zelenskyy this week over the phone, amid ongoing efforts to end the war in Ukraine.
Following the calls, both Russia and Ukraine agreed to a limited ceasefire against energy. The next step is for respective teams to conduct meetings to navigate how to reach a full ceasefire, according to the White House.
"Technical teams will meet in Saudi Arabia in the coming days to discuss broadening the ceasefire to the Black Sea on the way to a full ceasefire," the White House said in a statement Thursday. "They agreed this could be the first step toward the full end of the war and ensuring security. President Zelenskyy was grateful for the President’s leadership in this effort and reiterated his willingness to adopt a full ceasefire."
The Associated Press and Fox News’ Rachel Wolf contributed to this report.
The U.S. State Department has ended funding for tracking thousands of Ukrainian children abducted by Russia, and a U.S. database with information on the victims may have been deleted, according to a letter U.S. lawmakers plan to send to Trump administration officials on Wednesday.
A group of Democratic U.S. lawmakers penned the letter to Secretary of State Marco Rubio and Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent, urging the administration to restore the program that helps track the abducted Ukrainian children.
The administration has ended a government-funded initiative led by Yale University's Humanitarian Research Lab that tracked the mass deportation of children from Ukraine, meaning researchers have lost access to a significant amount of information — including satellite imagery — on roughly 30,000 children kidnapped from Ukraine.
"We have reason to believe that the data from the repository has been permanently deleted. If true, this would have devastating consequences," the letter, led by Ohio Rep. Greg Landsman, said.
News of the letter came on Tuesday, the same day U.S. President Donald Trump spoke with Russian President Vladimir Putin, who stopped short of agreeing to a 30-day truce in Moscow's war against Ukraine.
A person familiar with the tracking program said the canceled State Department contract led to the deletion of $26 million in war crimes evidence.
"They took $26 million of U.S. taxpayers money used for war crimes data and threw it into the woodchipper, including the dossiers on all the children," the person told Reuters.
"If you wanted to protect President Putin from prosecution, you nuke that thing. And they did it. It’s the final court-admissible version with all the metadata," the person added.
The letter to administration officials also calls for sanctions to punish officials in Russia and its ally Belarus who are involved in abducting children.
"These egregious, openly acknowledged violations of the rights of children afforded under international law demand consequences," the letter said.
Yale University's Humanitarian Research Lab also no longer has access to the satellite imagery needed to track the abducted children, according to the lawmakers.
"Our government is providing an essential service – one that does not require the transfer of weapons or cash to Ukraine – in pursuit of the noble goal of rescuing these children. We must, immediately, resume the work to help Ukraine bring these children home," the letter said.
Ukraine has described the abductions of tens of thousands of its children taken to Russia or Russian-occupied territory without parental consent as a war crime that meets the U.N. treaty definition of genocide.
Russia has claimed it has been evacuating people voluntarily to protect vulnerable children from being caught in the crossfire.
In March 2023, the International Criminal Court issued warrants for the arrest of Lvova-Belova and Putin in connection with the abduction of Ukrainian children, a move Russia denounced as "outrageous and unacceptable."
Eurojust, Europe's agency for criminal cooperation, said on Tuesday it learned the U.S. government was ending its support for the International Centre for the Prosecution of the Crime of Aggression against Ukraine, which was collecting evidence to prosecute Putin and others. The U.S. special prosecutor at Eurojust, Jessica Kim, would leave as part of the move.
The Associated Press, not exactly a White House favorite, has shot itself in the foot.
The following retraction is nothing short of humiliating:
"The Associated Press has withdrawn its story about U.S. Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard saying President Trump and Russian President Vladimir Putin ‘are very good friends.’ Gabbard was talking about Trump and Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi. The AP will publish a corrected version of the story."
Whoa! How do you run that piece in the first place without having it nailed down?
The wire service, you may recall, is suing the Trump administration for ousting its reporters from the White House pool over its refusal to refer to "Gulf of America." So, this unforced error puts the White House in I-told-you-so mode.
On Monday, when Trump was at the Kennedy Center, an NBC reporter tried to ask a question, Trump asked, "Who are you with?"
After the journalist identified himself, the president said: "I don’t want to talk to NBC anymore. I think you’re so discredited."
The Trump team later posted the exchange with "mic drop" emojis.
The point is that Trump dominates the news no matter what he does. And, as I’ve been saying for the 35 years I’ve known him, even a torrent of negative publicity helps him because his media detractors are playing on his turf.
While Trump was visiting the Kennedy Center, he "floated" the idea of personally hosting the annual awards show. And who’s going to stop him, since he’s purged the Democratic board members?
The ratings, he said, would skyrocket. And he’s right about that.
As the New York Times notes, a younger Trump dreamed of becoming a Broadway producer. He now says the Kennedy Center will concentrate on producing "Broadway hits."
And by the way, Trump released 80,000 pages of JFK assassination files yesterday and has asked for no redactions.
The president can make news on the slightest whim, just by posting on Truth Social.
He just went after Judge James Boasberg, who ordered the deportations of mostly Venezuelan gang members to be stopped while planes were still in the air:
"This judge, like many of the Crooked Judges’ I am forced to appear before, should be IMPEACHED!!!" WE DON’T WANT VICIOUS, VIOLENT, AND DEMENTED CRIMINALS, MANY OF THEM DERANGED MURDERERS, IN OUR COUNTRY."
The posting drew a rare rebuke from Chief Justice John Roberts:
"For more than two centuries, it has been established that impeachment is not an appropriate response to disagreement concerning a judicial decision. The normal appellate review process exists for that purpose."
The president is also renewing his habit of going after journalists personally. Ashley Parker had a highly successful career at the New York Times and Washington Post–she’s also an MSNBC analyst–who recently joined the Atlantic.
She asked Trump for an interview.
After dismissing the liberal Atlantic as a "Third Rate Magazine," Trump posted:
"Ashley Parker is not capable of doing a fair and unbiased interview. She is a Radical Left Lunatic, and has been as terrible as is possible for as long as I have known her. To this date, she doesn’t even know that I won the Presidency THREE times. If you have some other reporter, let us know, but Ashley is not capable or competent enough to understand the intricacies of High Level politics."
Parker is restrained, not radical, and in bringing up the 2020 election, Trump is asking her to accept something that has never been proven in court or by his own attorney general.
A magazine spokesperson said, "Atlantic reporters are diligent and fair and continue to pursue stories of importance to the public."
And then there is, you know, the actual job of the presidency. Trump reported yesterday on his 90-minute phone call with Vladimir Putin.
They "stressed the need for improved bilateral relations between the United States and Russia" – no surprise there.
"The leaders agreed that the movement to peace will begin with an energy and infrastructure ceasefire, as well as technical negotiations on implementation of a maritime ceasefire in the Black Sea, full ceasefire and permanent peace….
"They further discussed the need to stop proliferation of strategic weapons and will engage with others to ensure the broadest possible application. The two leaders shared the view that Iran should never be in a position to destroy Israel."
And: "The two leaders agreed that a future with an improved bilateral relationship between the United States and Russia has huge upside," including "enormous economic deals and geopolitical stability."
It seems to me that Trump got next to nothing. A 30-day pause in attacks on energy plants and infrastructure, that’s about it. Everything else is subject to negotiations, which gives the Kremlin more time to keep attacking Ukraine and lock in further territorial gains. A real cease-fire seems a long way off.
But whether Trump is on the attack or being attacked, he is driving the news every day, even inserting himself into culture and sports topics. Keep that in mind when the ratings-driven president hosts the Kennedy Center honors.
President Donald Trump and Russian President Vladimir Putin are in sync when it comes to Iran obtaining nuclear weapons, according to the White House.
Trump and Putin, who spoke over the phone Tuesday morning about how to draw an end to the war in Ukraine, agreed that Iran must not obtain access to weapons permitting Tehran to obliterate Israel, the White House said.
"The leaders spoke broadly about the Middle East as a region of potential cooperation to prevent future conflicts," the White House said in a statement after the call. "They further discussed the need to stop proliferation of strategic weapons and will engage with others to ensure the broadest possible application. The two leaders shared the view that Iran should never be in a position to destroy Israel."
Meanwhile, Russia is urging the U.S. to loosen its sanctions on Iran, which have crippled Tehran’s economy. Representatives from Russia met with Chinese and Iranian counterparts in Beijing Friday, and pressed the U.S. to withdraw the "unlawful" sanctions and resume nuclear discussions, according to a statement from the three countries.
"The three countries reiterated that political and diplomatic engagement and dialogue based on the principle of mutual respect remains the only viable and practical option in this regard," China’s Vice Foreign Minister Ma Zhaoxu read aloud in a joint statement Friday.
Russia has maintained a cozy relationship with Iran and has utilized Iranian drones in the war against Ukraine. For example, Russia started to employ the Iranian-made Shahed-131 and Shahed-136 series drones in 2022 to hit Ukrainian artillery targets and areas of Ukraine’s electricity distribution grid, according to the nonprofit organization Washington Institute for Near East Policy.
The Defense Intelligence Agency also released a report in 2023 detailing how Iran had given Russia access to "hundreds" of one-way attack air drones. Although Iran denied that the drones originated from Tehran, the Defense Intelligence Agency said it obtained debris from attacks in Ukraine that "clearly prove Iran's support to Russia."
Trump cautioned in February he believed that Iran was "close" to developing a nuclear weapon, and his administration reinstated a maximum pressure campaign against Iran through sanctions targeting Iran’s oil exports in February.
Additionally, Trump revealed March 7 that a nuclear deal with Iran could emerge in the near future and that he sent a letter to Iranian Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, urging Tehran to agree to a nuclear agreement.
Failure to do so could mean military intervention, he said.
"I would rather negotiate a deal," Trump told Fox Business in an interview March 9. "I'm not sure that everybody agrees with me, but we can make a deal that would be just as good as if you won militarily."
"But the time is happening now, the time is coming up," he said. "Something is going to happen one way or the other. I hope that Iran, and I've written them a letter saying I hope you're going to negotiate, because if we have to go in militarily, it's going to be a terrible thing for them."
Republican lawmakers hailed President Donald Trump after a nearly two-hour phone call with Russian President Vladimir Putin to discuss a peace deal in Ukraine, drawing contrasts between his efforts and those of former President Joe Biden.
"I’m encouraged by President Trump’s willingness to engage in diplomacy to negotiate peace between Ukraine and Russia — especially after Biden refused to even pick up the phone to try," Rep. Scott Perry, R-Pa., said of the call.
The House Foreign Affairs Committee, in reaction to the discussion, wrote, "President Trump got Vladimir Putin to agree that a ceasefire between Russia and Ukraine is necessary," and that "Iran cannot be in a position to destroy Israel."
"This is called THE ART OF THE DEAL!" the committee wrote.
Trump spoke with Putin over the phone earlier Tuesday "about the need for peace and a ceasefire in the Ukraine war," according to a readout of the meeting shared by White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt.
"This conflict should never have started and should have been ended long ago with sincere and good faith peace efforts. The leaders agreed that the movement to peace will begin with an energy and infrastructure ceasefire, as well as technical negotiations on implementation of a maritime ceasefire in the Black Sea, full ceasefire and permanent peace," it continued. "These negotiations will begin immediately in the Middle East."
Democrats, however, remained skeptical about whether Russia would honor a peace deal.
"Imagine a robber breaking into your home twice—each time blaming you for the break-in. Would you trust them to stop?" Rep. Jason Crow, D-Colo. said. "Vladimir Putin has never kept a promise or honored a deal. Any deal must be fair & enforceable."
Sen. Chris Coons, D-Del., said that "from these readouts, it's clear that Russia remains the obstacle to peace in Europe."
"I'm glad to see a halt on infrastructure strikes, but many of Putin's ‘requests’ like a ban on arms or intel sharing make clear what he is after—a neutered Ukraine that cannot defend itself," Coons wrote.
National Security Council spokesman Brian Hughes, in a statement shared with Fox News Digital in response to the Democratic lawmakers, said that under Trump, a deal is even closer to being reached.
"Just two weeks ago, both Ukraine and Russia were miles apart on a ceasefire agreement, and we are now closer to a deal thanks to the leadership of President Trump," Hughes said. "The goal remains the same: stop the killing and find a peaceful resolution to this conflict."
Trump, in a Truth Social post following the call, described the meeting as "very good and productive."
"Many elements of a Contract for Peace were discussed, including the fact that thousands of soldiers are being killed, and both President Putin and [Ukrainian President Volodymyr] Zelenskyy would like to see it end," Trump wrote in a social media post. "That process is now in full force and effect, and we will, hopefully, for the sake of Humanity, get the job done!"
Fox News Digital reached out to Biden's office for a response to Perry's criticism but did not immediately hear back.
President Donald Trump spoke with Russian President Vladimir Putin for at least 90 minutes Tuesday about ending the war in Ukraine, the White House said, noting that the two leaders agreed that "negotiations will begin immediately in the Middle East."
The two leaders also agreed to a ceasefire against energy infrastructure, both sides said.
The call began at 10 a.m. ET, according to White House spokesman Dan Scavino. The White House then said around 12:52 p.m. that the call was over, though it would not say initially exactly when each side hung up.
"Today, President Trump and President Putin spoke about the need for peace and a ceasefire in the Ukraine war. Both leaders agreed this conflict needs to end with a lasting peace," the White House said in a statement after the call. "They also stressed the need for improved bilateral relations between the United States and Russia. The blood and treasure that both Ukraine and Russia have been spending in this war would be better spent on the needs of their people.
"This conflict should never have started and should have been ended long ago with sincere and good faith peace efforts. The leaders agreed that the movement to peace will begin with an energy and infrastructure ceasefire, as well as technical negotiations on implementation of a maritime ceasefire in the Black Sea, full ceasefire and permanent peace," it continued. "These negotiations will begin immediately in the Middle East."
"The leaders spoke broadly about the Middle East as a region of potential cooperation to prevent future conflicts. They further discussed the need to stop proliferation of strategic weapons and will engage with others to ensure the broadest possible application. The two leaders shared the view that Iran should never be in a position to destroy Israel," the White House also said. "The two leaders agreed that a future with an improved bilateral relationship between the United States and Russia has huge upside. This includes enormous economic deals and geopolitical stability when peace has been achieved."
During the call, Putin said a complete cessation of military aid to Ukraine was a key condition for ending the war, Russia's state-run TASS news agency reported, citing the Kremlin.
Trump said last night that "Many elements of a Final Agreement" to end the Ukraine war "have been agreed to, but much remains."
Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov said Tuesday that the two leaders would speak about the war in Ukraine but that there are a "large number of questions" regarding normalizing U.S.-Russia relations, according to The Associated Press.
State Department spokesperson Tammy Bruce said Monday that "the ball is now in Russia's court" to accept a U.S.-proposed ceasefire deal that Ukraine agreed to last week.
The U.S.-backed proposal, which includes an immediate 30-day ceasefire and guaranteed resumption of U.S. military aid and intelligence to Ukraine, was finalized during diplomatic talks in Saudi Arabia last week.
"Ukraine expressed readiness to accept the U.S. proposal to enact an immediate interim 30-day ceasefire to the Russia-Ukraine conflict. The ball is now in Russia's court," Bruce said during a State Department briefing.
The last time Trump and Putin spoke was in mid-February.
"I just had a lengthy and highly productive phone call with President Vladimir Putin of Russia. We discussed Ukraine, the Middle East, Energy, Artificial Intelligence, the power of the Dollar, and various other subjects," Trump said at the time.
"We both reflected on the Great History of our Nations, and the fact that we fought so successfully together in World War II, remembering, that Russia lost tens of millions of people, and we, likewise, lost so many!" Trump continued.
"We each talked about the strengths of our respective Nations, and the great benefit that we will someday have in working together. But first, as we both agreed, we want to stop the millions of deaths taking place in the War with Russia/Ukraine," he also said.
Fox News' Alec Schemmel and James Levinson contributed to this report.
President Donald Trump said he will speak with Russian President Vladimir Putin on Tuesday about the final points of a deal to end the war in Ukraine.
In a post on his Truth Social platform, Trump said many "elements" of the Final Agreement" have been agreed to "but much remains."
"Thousands of young soldiers, and others, are being killed. Each week brings 2,500 soldier deaths, from both sides, and it must end NOW," Trump wrote. "I look very much forward to the call with President Putin."
Some points of discussion could involed territorial concessions by Kyiv and control of the Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant.
The Trump administration has been working on a deal to end the three-year war. Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Alexander Grushko reportedly said that the Kremlin wants an "ironclad" guarantee that Ukraine will be prohibited from joining the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO).
Last week, White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt told reporters that "we have never been closer to peace," as the U.S. waits for Russia’s answer on a 30-day ceasefire agreement.
Ukraine accepted the deal earlier in the week after a meeting with U.S. officials in Saudi Arabia, on the condition that Moscow commits to the plan.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy has called for tougher sanctions on Russia and accused Putin of trying to drag out the peace talks to prolong the war.
"It’s clear to everyone in the world—even to those who refused to acknowledge the truth for the past three years—that it is Putin who continues to drag out this war," the Ukrainian leader wrote Monday on X. "For a week now, Putin has been unable to squeeze out ‘yes’ to the ceasefire proposal. He’s saying whatever he wants, but not what the whole world wants to hear."
He called for world leaders to pressure Moscow into ending the conflict.
"The unconditional ceasefire proposal is essentially about saving lives, allowing diplomats to work on ensuring security and a lasting peace—the proposal that Russia is ignoring," he said. "Pressure is needed to finally make Moscow accept that their war must be brought to an end."
President Donald Trump's ninth week in office is expected to include a phone call with Russian President Vladimir Putin as the nations inch closer to reportedly securing a peace deal between Ukraine and Russia.
"The president uses the timeframe weeks, and I don't disagree with him. I am really hopeful that we're going to see some real progress here," U.S. special envoy to the Middle East Steve Witkoff said on CNN on Sunday. "Nobody expected progress this fast. This is a highly, very complicated situation, and yet we're bridging the gap between two sides. So, lots of things that remain to be discussed, but I think the two presidents are going to have a really good and positive discussion this week."
Witkoff's remarks come after U.S. and Ukrainian officials agreed to the terms of a potential ceasefire with Russia during a meeting in Saudi Arabia last week. Witkoff subsequently met with Putin in Moscow on Thursday, when the pair held "positive" and "solution-based" discussions.
"Before this visit, there was another visit, and before that visit, the two sides were miles apart," Witkoff added. "The two sides are, today, a lot closer. We had some really positive results coming out of the Saudi Arabia discussion led by our national security advisor, Mike Waltz, and our secretary of state, Marco Rubio."
A pair of American astronauts who have been left on the International Space Station (ISS) for nine months are in the midst of returning home and could reach Earth later this week.
Astronauts Suni Williams and Barry Wilmore traveled to the space station in June of last year for what was intended to be an eight-day mission, but it devolved into a long-term stay after their spacecraft malfunctioned. Tech billionaire and Trump ally Elon Musk launched a rescue crew to bring the astronauts home over the weekend through his company SpaceX.
The SpaceX team reached the space station overnight Saturday, inching the astronauts closer to their expected return to Earth later this week.
Trump has railed against former President Biden for not rescuing the astronauts during his administration, telling the media earlier this month that Biden "left them alone" in space because he was "embarrassed by what happened."
"The most incompetent president in our history has allowed that to happen to you, but this president won't let that happen," the president continued at the time.
The Trump administration is in the midst of mass deportation efforts, including deporting Tren de Aragua gang members under a wartime law invoked by Trump last week. U.S. District Judge James Boasberg ordered the Trump administration to halt its deportations of illegal immigrants under the act on Saturday, ordering planes carrying migrants to return to the U.S.
The Alien Enemies Act of 1798 allows deportation of natives and citizens of an enemy nation without a hearing and has been invoked three times before, including, during the War of 1812, World War I and World War II.
Boasberg set a hearing for Friday regarding the deportation efforts, teeing up another court battle over Trump's immigration policies.
In the meantime, the Trump administration has already flown hundreds of Tren de Aragua gang members to El Salvador, where the nation's president agreed to house the individuals in a notoriously locked-down prison designed to handle cartel and gang members.
"Today, the first 238 members of the Venezuelan criminal organization, Tren de Aragua, arrived in our country. They were immediately transferred to CECOT, the Terrorism Confinement Center, for a period of one year (renewable)," El Salvador President Nayib Bukele posted to X on Sunday morning, accompanied by video footage of planes on a tarmac.
Trump is anticipated to have another busy week back in the Oval Office, which follows him signing 89 executive orders since Jan. 20 – marking more executive orders signed in just months than any of his predecessors signed their entire first years in office, stretching back to President Jimmy Carter.
Fox News Digital's Danielle Wallace contributed to this report.
President Donald Trump says he'll speak with Russia's leader, Vladimir Putin, on Tuesday.
MIKHAIL KLIMENTYEV/AFP/Getty Images
President Donald Trump told reporters he will speak to Vladimir Putin on Tuesday.
"We will be talking about land. We will be talking about power plants," Trump said.
Ukraine has said it is ready to accept a US proposal for a 30-day cease-fire with Russia.
President Donald Trump said he plans to speak to Russia's leader, Vladimir Putin, on Tuesday about ending the Ukraine war.
"We will see if we have something to announce maybe by Tuesday. I will be speaking to President Putin on Tuesday," Trump told reporters on board Air Force One on Sunday, per multiple media reports.
"A lot of work's been done over the weekend. We want to see if we can bring that war to an end," Trump added.
The Russian invasion of Ukraine has now run over three years since it began in February 2022, with both sides estimated to have lost hundreds of thousands of soldiers.
Kyiv is estimated to have had 80,000 of its troops killed and another 400,000 wounded, while Western analyses say Russia likely has more than 700,000 troops killed and wounded.
Trump has often cited the loss of life as a key reason he's pushing for peace as soon as possible. Describing himself as a mediator between Russia and Ukraine, he's sought to pull both parties toward a cease-fire agreement — a change from the Biden administration's strategy of trying to starve Moscow into capitulation.
That effort has introduced new tensions in the US-Ukraine relationship. Earlier this month, the Trump administration paused all military aid and intelligence sharing with Ukraine.
Those were later restored after Ukraine said it was ready to accept a US proposal for an immediate 30-day cease-fire with Russia. Trump had also threatened Putin and Russia with sanctions if they didn't agree to a cease-fire with Ukraine.
"We will be talking about land. We will be talking about power plants," Trump said of the coming negotiations with Putin.
With Ukraine agreeing to the temporary cease-fire terms, the Trump administration must now focus on securing Russia's approval.
"The ball is now in their court," State Secretary Marco Rubio said last week of Russia.
Moscow has stepped up missile and drone attacks on Ukrainian cities despite ongoing talks in the last two weeks, prompting fears of a long road toward a peace agreement.
Kyiv and Europe, meanwhile, have repeatedly voiced concerns that the US may try to broker peace terms without direct Ukrainian input.
Both the UK and France have proposed stationing troops in Ukraine to act as a peacekeeping force to oversee the cease-fire.
On Sunday, Russia's deputy foreign minister Alexander Grushko told local media in an interview published Monday that his country will not accept having any NATO troops based in Ukraine.
Ukraine, too, wants to be part of the conversation.
"No decision can be made without Ukraine on how to end the war in Ukraine," President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said in February, as Trump indicated his team had been speaking with Putin.
The White House did not immediately respond to a request for comment from Business Insider.
President Donald Trump said he will likely be speaking with Russian President Vladimir Putin on Tuesday while speaking with reporters on Air Force One Sunday night.
The president was returning to Washington, D.C., from Florida when he told the reporters of the upcoming discussion.
"We will see if we have something to announce maybe by Tuesday," Trump said, sharing that the possibility of divvying up land, power plants and other assets has been discussed in an attempt to end Russia's war in Ukraine.
He added that he thinks "we're doing pretty well" with Russia and that "a lot of work [was] done over the weekend."
"We want to see if we can bring that war to an end," Trump said. "Maybe we can, maybe we can't, but I think we have a very good chance."
Trump confirming he would be talking to Putin on Tuesday comes hours after U.S. special envoy to the Middle East Steve Witkoff said on CNN's "State of the Union" that the conversation would likely take place this week.
Witkoff said he had a "positive" and "solution-based" discussion with Putin in Moscow last week a few days after American and Ukrainian officials agreed to a potential ceasefire with Russia.
Their meeting on Thursday marked the second time the two have met in the past month.
Fox News Digital's Danielle Wallace contributed to this report.
This is a breaking news story. Check back for updates.
U.S. special envoy to the Middle East Steve Witkoff said Sunday that President Donald Trump will likely speak with Russian President Vladimir Putin this week.
In an appearance on CNN’s "State of the Union," Witkoff was asked when a deal to end the war in Ukraine could be anticipated.
"The president uses the timeframe weeks, and I don't disagree with him. I am really hopeful that we're going to see some real progress here," Witkoff said. "Nobody expected progress this fast. This is a highly, very complicated situation, and yet we're bridging the gap between two sides. So, lots of things that remain to be discussed, but I think the two presidents are going to have a really good and positive discussion this week."
Trump's special envoy met with Putin in Moscow on Thursday, days after U.S. and Ukrainian officials in Saudi Arabia agreed to the terms of a potential ceasefire with Russia.
Witkoff said he met with Putin for between three and four hours and had a "positive" and "solution-based" discussion.
"Before this visit, there was another visit, and before that visit, the two sides were miles apart," Witkoff told CNN host Jake Tapper. "The two sides are, today, a lot closer. We had some really positive results coming out of the Saudi Arabia discussion led by our national security advisor, Mike Waltz, and our secretary of state, Marco Rubio."
"I describe my conversation with President Putin as equally positive," Witkoff said. "The two sides have… we’ve narrowed the differences between them, and now we’re sitting at the table. I was with the president all day yesterday, I’ll be with him today, we’re sitting with him, discussing how to narrow it even further."
It was the second time Witkoff had met with Putin in the last month. The first sit-down in mid-February resulted in the Russians releasing U.S. prisoner Marc Fogel.
Witkoff said he briefed Trump, Vice President JD Vance, chief of staff Susie Wiles and Waltz from the U.S. embassy within five to 10 minutes of meeting with Putin last week.
"President Trump has been involved in every aspect and dimension of these discussions," Witkoff said. "The president is getting updates in real time on everything that’s happening, and he’s involved in every important decision here. I expect that there will be a call with both presidents this week, and we’re also continuing to engage and have conversations with the Ukrainians. We’re advising them on everything we’re thinking about."
"The four regions are of critical importance here," Witkoff said of the terms of the deal. "And we’re in discussions with Ukraine, we’re in discussions with all these stakeholder European countries, so that includes France, Britain, Norway, Finland… the whole host.… And we’re in discussions with the Russians too about those regions. We’re also in discussion with all other elements that would be encompassed in a ceasefire."
Witkoff flew to Moscow last week from Doha, Qatar, where he mediated negotiations between Israel and Hamas on a potential extension of their ceasefire agreement.
President Donald Trump is blaming former President Joe Biden for getting the U.S. into "a real mess with Russia," but said he would get the U.S. out of it. He called on Russia to commit to the U.S. proposal for a 30-day ceasefire that Ukraine agreed to earlier this week.
"Millions of people are needlessly dead, never to be seen again… and there will be many more to follow if we don’t get the ceasefire and final agreement with Russia completed and signed," Trump wrote on Truth Social. "There would have been NO WAR if I were president. It just, 100%, would not have happened."
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy called on the Trump administration to put more sanctions on Russia on Friday, claiming Russian President Vladimir Putin is looking to prolong the bloody three-year war. Putin said on Thursday that he agreed with the proposal in "principle." Zelenskyy believes Putin will try to block the deal in any way possible.
Trump hasn’t ruled out imposing more sanctions, but said he doesn’t "want" to go that route and would rather have peace. He did acknowledge, however, that the U.S. could make financial moves that are "very bad for Russia."
"In a financial sense, yeah, we could do things, very bad for Russia. It would be devastating for Russia," Trump told reporters in the Oval Office on Thursday. "But I don’t want to do that because I want to see peace."
In the same post, Trump listed numerous tragic events and hardships that he believes could have been avoided if he, and not former President Biden, won the 2020 election.
"Likewise, there would have been no October 7th with Israel, the pullout from Afghanistan would have been done with strength and pride, and would not have been the most embarrassing day in the history of our country, it could have been a moment of glory. Also, there would not have been any perceptible inflation," Trump wrote in a Friday post on Truth Social.
Trump has not been shy about criticizing former President Biden, and even called out his predecessor multiple times in his address to a joint session of Congress. In his speech, Trump declared Biden was "the worst president in American history."
Trump also slammed the Green New Deal, which he calls the "Green New Scam," said Biden didn’t do enough to free Marc Fogel from Russian detention, criticized Biden’s spending on the war in Ukraine and emphasized Biden’s failures on the border.
"The media and our friends in the Democrat Party kept saying we needed new legislation. ‘We must have legislation to secure the border.’ But it turned out that all we really needed was a new president," Trump said as the room erupted with applause.
President Donald Trump threatened to impose "large scale" sanctions against Russia after the country carried out a massive attack on Ukraine’s energy infrastructure. In a post on Truth Social, President Trump said he was "strongly considering" sanctions and tariffs "until a ceasefire and final settlement agreement on peace is reached."
National Economic Council Director Kevin Hassett told reporters that Trump is ready to use carrots or sticks" to bring both Russia and Ukraine to the table. When asked by Fox News Channel Senior White House Correspondent Jacqui Heinrich for more details on what could be sanctioned, Hassett simply said there are "a heck of a lot of things."
In the overnight attack, Russia reportedly fired 67 missiles and 194 drones in an overnight attack that hit Ukraine’s energy and gas infrastructure, Reuters reported, citing Ukraine’s air force. According to reports, at least 10 people were injured in Russia’s attack, including a child.
"Russia continues its energy terror," Ukrainian Energy Minister Herman Halushchenko wrote on Facebook. "Again energy and gas infrastructure in various regions of Ukraine has come under massive missile and drone fire."
Russia has attacked Ukraine’s energy infrastructure multiple times throughout the three-year war. In April 2024, Russia destroyed one of Ukraine's largest power plants, and in December 2024, Russia pummeled Ukraine's power grid.
President Trump also included a message to both Ukraine and Russia in his Truth Social post: "Get to the table right now, before it is too late."
Friday’s attack seemed to be in response to Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy confirming that his team would participate in peace talks with the U.S. in Saudi Arabia next week. While Zelenskyy himself will not be at the meeting, his team will sit with their American counterparts to discuss ending the war.
In his announcement of Ukraine’s participation in the talks, Zelenskyy said his country is "most interested in peace." The issue of peace caused friction between Trump and Zelenskyy, after the president said his Ukrainian counterpart was "not ready for peace" following their Oval Office spat.
"He disrespected the United States of America in its cherished Oval Office. He can come back when he is ready for peace," Trump wrote on Truth Social last week after the heated meeting.
However, things seemed to have smoothed over between the two leaders, with Trump reading a letter from Zelenskyy during his address to a joint session of Congress. Trump said he appreciated Zelenskyy’s letter and that he wants to see the "savage conflict" end.
Fox News Channel's Jacqui Heinrich contributed to this report.
President Vladimir Putin at the 2022 Russian AI Journey conference.
Pavel Bednyakov, Sputnik, Kremlin Pool Photo via AP
Russia has touted its leading LLM, GigaChat MAX, as part of a national AI strategy.
But the model is "unremarkable" and lags behind US and Chinese offerings, AI experts told BI.
While the war in Ukraine has stunted development, Moscow may still be developing military AI.
Russian President Vladimir Putin wants his country to compete in the global race to build AI, besting models coming out of China and the US. But its flagship large language model, or LLM, isn't even the best at speaking Russian.
On the Russian-language version of LLM Arena — where users go to compare and rank the answers of different LLMs — GigaChat MAX comes joint-eighth at the time of writing, behind various versions of Claude, DeepSeek, and ChatGPT.
YandexGPT 4 Pro, an LLM developed by the Russian search engine Yandex, is even lower, at joint 18th.
On the English-language version, neither appears in the ranking of more than 170 LLMs.
GigaChat MAX was developed by Russia's state-majority-owned Sberbank. When its latest iteration launched in November, its Moscow-based lead developer, Evgeny Kosarev, said on LinkedIn that it was "close to GPT4o in quality on Russian and English."
But experts have told Business Insider that, despite Putin emphasizing AI development as a crucial avenue for Russian foreign policy,GigaChat MAX is months behind American and Chinese competitors. The country's war against Ukraine has also drained it of expertise.
A spokesperson for Yandex told BI that its latest model, launched on February 25th, is on par with state-of-the-art models on a number of measures.
A spokesperson for GigaChat MAX did not respond to a request for comment.
An 'unremarkable' model
For now,GigaChat MAX, Russia's most developed LLM, is"unremarkable," Lukasz Olejnik, a visiting senior research fellow in cybersecurity at the Department of War Studies at King's College, London, told BI.
On "benchmarks" — standardized tests for AI effectiveness — the models' scores "are much lower," he said, adding that they don't surpass any of the cutting-edge, or "frontier," models, and don't involve any particular innovation.
Ben Dubow, a senior fellow at the Center for European Policy Analysis and CTO of data-analysis firm Omelas, added that GigaChat MAX lacked an edge in many ways.
While it handles math well, in the Russian language it is far behind most leading Western and Chinese LLMs on some benchmarks, Dubow wrote in The Moscow Times in January.
He said that leading LLMs developed in the US were a year ahead of GigaChat MAX's current level on the industry-standard "Massive Multitask Language Understanding," or MMLU, which tests an LLM's general knowledge and problem-solving ability in text-based answers across a huge range of subjects.
Dubow also told BI that most AIs are being held to more advanced benchmarks, with MMLU "almost considered passé at this point."
"Besting American and Chinese models on Russian language prompts is a top priority for the Russian government's AI strategy, but MAX has not achieved that," Dubow said.
The war in Ukraine is holding Russia's AI development back
Russian President Vladimir Putin has repeatedly emphasized the importance of AI, including at a December conference where he touted GigaChat MAX and said Russia was ready to assist other nations with developing AI.
Samuel Bendett, a specialist in Russian military technology at the Center for Strategic and International Studies,told BI that AI was "a status thing" for Russia.
But per a global AI ranking produced by UK media startup Tortoise Media, Russia is the only one out of the five "great power" countries — the US, China, France, the UK, and Russia — not at the top of the list. Russia is ranked 31st.
Bendett named several factors holding Moscow's AI sector back.
Russia's private sector is too small to foster real competition, with almost everything government-supported,he said.
Sberbank CEO German Gref listens to Putin at the 2022 AI Journey conference.
Pavel Bednyakov, Sputnik, Kremlin Pool Photo via AP
Although Sberbank is increasingly casting itself as a technology company, "there is no equivalent to OpenAI and Microsoft or Google or Huawei or Alibaba," he continued.
Additionally, Russia's invasion of Ukraine has isolated it from both global expertise and collaboration, as well as access to tech like microchips necessary to train and run complex AI models efficiently.
"The story of the Russian AI industry is, in a lot of ways, Putin's expansionism undermining Russia's global standing," said Dubow.
2014 — when Russia annexed Crimea — was a transformative year for AI in the West and China.
Meanwhile, 2022, the year Russia launched its full-scale invasion of Ukraine, was the year ChatGPT launched, sparking the generative AI boom.
Thewar in Ukraineaccelerated a major brain drain from Russia, according to Dubow.
Bendett added that Russia lacks "hundreds of thousands" of high-tech researchers, although he said that he believed many of the "tech refugees" who left Russia to avoid the draft have started to trickle back.
Putin acknowledged the problems last year, blaming "unfriendly countries" for the roadblocks and vowing to increase the number of people graduating in AI technology to more than 15,000 a year by 2030, Russia's TASS news agency reported, citing government documents.
Serhii Kupriienko, CEO of Swarmer, a Ukrainian startup specializing in AI-based systems, told BI that over the next decade, the US and China's LLMs will help them scale their economies "exponentially" by boosting productivity across various sectors, creating jobs in AI, and speeding up innovation.
Meanwhile, Russia's struggles with AI mean its likeliest path forward is to "be subordinate to China and rely on what China's producing," Dubow said.
The 'holy grail for AI' could boost Russia's military
The Kremlin's repeatedpublicstatements on AI and the ongoing war in Ukraine have led some analysts to conclude Russia may be secretly developing a dual-use LLM with military applications.
In 2022, a Russian official announced the creation of a department for developing AI within the defense ministry.
"Russia envisions AI as a transformative tool for its military," Saratoga Foundation military analysts Timothy Thomas and Glen Howard wrote in a February review of Russian writings on military AI.
Vitaliy Goncharuk, who chaired Ukraine's AI Committee between 2019 and 2022, believes Russia may be training its AI on the vast amounts of battlefield data being generated in Ukraine.
Both Russia's and Ukraine's militaries are sitting on vast repositories of data that could be used to train military AI.
Elena Tita/Global Images Ukraine via Getty Images
Telegram posts and channels, drone footage, satellite imagery, sound sensors, civilian reports, and hacked material from Ukraine's Delta cloud-based management system — which feeds Ukrainian commanders with battlefield data — all provide ample material, Goncharuk said.
AI developed on this would not only help Russia improve its precision in identifying targets but also help it plan its decision-making and real-time front-line operations, Goncharuk said. It could even predict Ukraine's future decision-making and future battlefield operations, he added.
Ukraine, too, has gathered vast quantities of battlefield data from three years of war — something that is "truly the holy grail of training your AI models and systems on battlefield target recognition and selection," Bendetttold BI.
It would be difficult to imagine Russia not quietly also using this data, he added.
"They constantly hint at that," he said.
Editor's note: This article was updated after publication to include a comment from Yandex.
Most of the media are blaming Donald Trump for the shocking shouting match that led to him kicking Volodymyr Zelenskyy out of the White House.
The result, these journalists and commentators say, is to put America’s relationship with Ukraine on life support as its people continue to fight and die in an invasion launched by Russia, even as Trump continues to tout his good relationship with Vladimir Putin. It’s the Kremlin leader who is the dictator, not Zelenskyy, and it is Russia, not Ukraine, that started the war to restore its smaller neighbor to Soviet satellite status – as Trump well knows.
There is no question that Trump, prodded by JD Vance, lost his temper in the Oval Office and that derailed the meeting, leaving the lunch that had been prepared for their teams to be eaten by staffers.
But Trump also makes a fair point that he can’t do a deal with Russia if he’s constantly attacking its leader (something he’s obviously not inclined to do, given their history, including the Helsinki summit).
At the same time, Zelenskyy was justified in asking for security guarantees, saying that Putin has a history of violating agreements, from the 2014 invasion of Crimea to the brutal war – including the deliberate targeting of civilians – that he launched three years ago.
But Zelenskyy had one job: Manage the meeting with Trump and sign the expected rare minerals agreement. And he utterly failed. He took the bait. And while he might have gotten some sympathy – Britain and France embraced him and promised to send peacekeeping troops after a settlement – the Ukrainian leader may have irreparably damaged his relationship with Trump.
The president was blunt in saying that without U.S. aid, Zelenskyy doesn’t have "the cards" to play – but he is right.
I did a lengthy "Media Buzz" interview with Karoline Leavitt, Donald Trump’s press secretary, leading off with the White House fireworks. She is very skilled at pushing back.
She told me Zelenskyy was "antagonistic, and frankly, he was rude. He picked a fight with the Vice President of the United States." (It was kinda the other way around.) "He repeatedly interrupted President Trump." (That’s true.)
"President Zelenskyy wouldn't even agree to a ceasefire. If you want a war to end. How can you not agree to stop the fighting? You have the greatest deterrent in the Oval Office in President Trump, and you need to trust his ability to deter Russia's aggression."
Well, Zelenskyy doesn’t trust Trump because he believes a ceasefire would lock in Russia’s territorial gains from the invasion. But what choice does he have?
The thing that struck me most is that I can’t imagine this meltdown would have happened if the meeting was held behind closed doors – the usual venue for finalizing agreements. So as much as I support journalistic access, it’s 40 minutes of press questions that framed the dialogue.
So I asked Leavitt why, even though Trump ended things by pronouncing it "great television," he did the meeting in public.
"Because President Trump is the most transparent president in history," she responded. "And as he said, it was great for the cameras to be in there because the American people and the world were able to see what the president and his team has seen behind the scenes in negotiating with President Zelenskyy's team."
Will Zelenskyy come back to the White House when, as Trump said, he’s ready to make peace? Who the hell knows at this point? But it’s a huge setback.
David Sanger, the veteran diplomatic correspondent for the New York Times, has the most penetrating big-picture take.
What the president wants "is a normalization of the relationship with Russia. If that means rewriting the history of Moscow’s illegal invasion three years ago, dropping investigations of Russian war crimes or refusing to offer Ukraine long-lasting security guarantees, then Mr. Trump, in this assessment of his intentions, is willing to make that deal."
Sanger suggests that Trump, a constant critic of NATO, is walking away from the Atlantic alliance that has thrived for 80 years.
The president "makes no secret of his view that the post-World War II system, created by Washington, ate away at American power."
To Trump, "such a system gave smaller and less powerful countries leverage over the United States, leaving Americans to pick up far too much of the tab for defending allies and promoting their prosperity.
"While his predecessors – both Democrats and Republicans – insisted that alliances in Europe and Asia were America’s greatest force multiplier, keeping the peace and allowing trade to flourish, Mr. Trump viewed them as a bleeding wound."
Look, Trump ran as the America First candidate who kept us out of wars. Many Americans, especially Republicans, have lost patience with U.S. aid to Ukraine when the money could be spent at home. The aid, I should add, is nowhere near the $350 billion that Trump keeps claiming, but it’s been substantial.
The rare minerals deal at least would have given the United States an economic incentive to keep backing Ukraine and partially paid our country back for its generosity.
But there is, in my view, a far stronger argument for supporting Ukraine. If Putin succeeds in dismembering part of the country, he will have been rewarded for launching the illegal invasion, and its barbaric practice of deliberately bombing apartment buildings and train stations.
And does anyone seriously believe he would stop there? Isn’t it extremely likely that Putin would attack another neighboring country?
Trump’s approach, aligning ourselves with Russia at the expense of Europe, may well be popular. But if he stands by that plan, the shouting in the White House may be remembered as a turning point for the old world order.
Footnote: Zelenskyy said something monumentally dumb yesterday that vindicated Trump’s stance that he’s not ready to reach a settlement with Russia. Zelenskyy predicted that the end of the war was "still very, very far away," the AP reports.
The president quickly took to Truth Social: "This is the worst statement that could have been made by Zelenskyy, and America will not put up with it for much longer!...What are they thinking?" And Trump later told reporters: "Now maybe somebody doesn’t want to make a deal, and if somebody doesn’t want to make a deal, I think that person won’t be around very long."
What are they thinking? I don’t have a clue. This is clearly self-destructive.
Russian recruitment is still going strong into 2025, and Ukraine expects Moscow to keep hiring people straight out of criminal trials, a top intelligence official said.
AP Photo/Alexander Zemlianichenko
A top Ukrainian official said Russia beat its 2024 recruitment goal and is still doing so in 2025.
That's after Moscow already raised its goal to 430,000 troops last year.
It comes as Russia has poured cash into sign-up bonuses and passed laws to recruit crime suspects.
The deputy chief of Ukraine's military intelligence said Russia is exceeding its recruitment targets, affirming Moscow's earlier claim of hiring over 440,000 soldiers in 2024.
That recruiting success is set to continue in 2025, Maj. Gen. Vadim Skibitsky said in an interview published by the news agency RBC Ukraine on Monday.
"In January, they fulfilled their recruitment plans by 107%," said Skibitsky. "This issue remains relevant, and the Russian authorities have no problem with staffing their troops and filling losses."
Skibitsky said Russia initially set a hiring target of 380,000 troops in 2024 but raised it to 430,000 recruits. And beat that goal, he added.
In December, Dmitry Medvedev, the chairman of Russia's security council, said Moscow had signed contracts with 440,000 new soldiers in 2024.
Skibitsky confirmed that number in his Monday interview and said that Russia officially plans to recruit another 343,000 soldiers in 2025.
"But based on the experience of 2024, we know that these plans inevitably change, in the upward direction," he said.
Recruiting at that scale is allowing Russia to continue fighting intensely in Ukraine, Skibitsky said.
"It is important to understand that almost 80% of those recruited under contract are used to replace combat losses," he told RBC Ukraine.
These reported figures come as the Kremlin has poured cash into one-time recruitment bonuses for the military — just one of many ways it's pushing its economy and spending toward defense.
In July, Russian leader Vladimir Putin signed a decree that more than doubled the baseline sign-up bonus from 195,000 rubles to 400,000 rubles for the rest of 2024.
The 400,000 ruble payout is worth about $4,450 now. But some regions upped their bonuses to nearly 2 million rubles last year, putting them on par with the US military's sign-on payments.
"For the Russian Federation, these are very large sums," Skibitsky told RBC Ukraine.
Federal statistics from the Russian government in December cited the average monthly wage in the country as 86,500 rubles.
Ukraine expects Russia to also significantly ramp up the number of soldiers it recruits from prisons or criminal trials.
With Russia already actively recruiting from prisons, Putin signed a bill in October allowing those who face criminal charges to avoid their trials or convictions if they enlist in the military.
Skibitsky said Russia's plans for 2025 include 30% of its forces being made up of "special contingents," which describe units fielding inmates or soldiers who signed up to avoid charges.
That's up from 15% of its forces involving such troops last year, Skibitsky said.
"This issue is already arising for the General Staff of the Armed Forces of the Russian Federation — what to do with these people and how to work with them," he said.
Analysts from the Washington-based think tank Institute for the Study of War wrote that Russia likely increased its recruitment target in 2024 because that's when it stepped up the intensity of its assaults in Ukraine.
ISW analysts wrote that Russia will likely have to raise its recruitment quota again this year to maintain that strategy.
"Continued Western military aid would help Ukrainian forces inflict additional losses on the Russian military that would likely intensify Russia's economic and military issues and force Putin into making concessions during meaningful negotiations in 2025," they wrote.
U.K. Prime Minister Keir Starmer put forward a framework for a peace plan between Ukraine and Russia on Sunday, though he acknowledged it relies heavily on assumed U.S. support.
Starmer revealed the plan along with French President Emmanuel Macron and other European leaders during a meeting with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy on Sunday. In a concession to President Donald Trump's administration, Starmer emphasized that European countries would need to "step up their own share of the burden" toward security guarantees for Ukraine in the event of a peace deal.
Starmer said the U.K. is prepared to deploy boots on the ground in Ukraine as well as air force assets to ensure Russia does not infringe on a peace agreement. He nevertheless stated that the plan would rely heavily on U.S. backing as well.
Macron told French media that European leaders were discussing a plan that would freeze strikes from the air, sea and on energy infrastructure for 30 days in Ukraine. He said the window could be used to negotiate a wider peace deal.
Meanwhile, Zelenskyy himself has been on damage control since a disastrous meeting with Trump and Vice President JD Vance at the White House on Friday. Zelenskyy has emphasized that he is still willing to sign a rare earth minerals deal with the White House. Secretary of State Marco Rubio on Sunday ruled out "security guarantees" for Ukraine before beginning peace talks.
"The security guarantees, which I actually like to call deterrence, is all contingent upon there being a peace," Rubio told ABC "This Week." "Everybody saying security guarantees to secure the peace, you first have to have a peace."
The Ukrainian leader remains largely unapologetic, saying after Sunday's meetings in Europe that the "best security guarantees are a strong Ukrainian army."
"The failure of Ukraine would not just mean Putin's success, it would be a failure for Europe, it would be a failure for the U.S.," he said.
Many Republicans on Capitol Hill have rallied behind Trump's criticism of Zelenskyy. Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., called on the Ukrainian leader to resign on Sunday.
"He either needs to resign and send somebody over that we can do business with, or he needs to change," Graham said after Friday's meeting.
Zelenskyy retorted that Graham could weigh in on Ukrainian leadership when he became a Ukrainian citizen, to which Graham responded: "Unfortunately, until there is an election, no one has a voice in Ukraine."
According to the senator, he doesn't think Americans saw the Ukrainian president as someone they feel comfortable going "into business with" following the televised dispute.
Graham also stressed that the Ukrainian-American relationship is "vitally important." However, he cast doubt on whether Zelenskyy could ever "do a deal with the United States."
