Trump Says He Believes Russia Wants Peace Even as Putin Vows to Take All of Donbas
Department of Research and Strategic Studies 10-12-2025
U.S. President Donald Trump said Wednesday that he believes Russia’s Vladimir Putin wants to end the war in Ukraine, even as the Kremlin leader renewed threats to seize more Ukrainian territory and peace talks in Moscow this week failed to produce a breakthrough.
Trump’s special envoy Steve Witkoff and son-in-law Jared Kushner met with Putin and other top Russian officials at the Kremlin on Tuesday to discuss a new U.S. peace plan, which was drafted with input from Ukrainian officials.
After the talks, Kremlin foreign policy adviser Yury Ushakov told journalists that the sides were unable to find a compromise to end the war, now approaching its fourth year, though he called the meeting with Witkoff and Kushner “useful” and “constructive.”
Trump echoed that sentiment on Wednesday, telling reporters in the Oval Office that the American delegation “had a reasonably good meeting with President Putin.”
He cautioned that it was too early to predict the outcome of the negotiations “because it does take two to tango.” But he also said he believed that Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky should have agreed to a ceasefire during their first meeting at the White House in February.
“That would have been a much better time to settle. But [Ukrainian officials], in their wisdom, decided not to do that. They have a lot of things against them right now,” Trump said.
