President Trump responds sarcasticly to USA TODAY about Putin and tomahawk question
Asked by USA Today’s White House correspondent about tomahawking Ukraine, President Trump responded sarcastically:
WASHINGTON – President Donald Trump and Russian President Vladimir Putin have canceled a previously scheduled meeting in Budapest, casting doubt on the president’s latest attempt to secure a ceasefire to stop Russian fighting in Ukraine.
White House officials confirmed the summit was cancelled, telling USA TODAY that a “productive phone call” between Secretary of State Marco Rubio and Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov made the meeting unnecessary. The official said there are no immediate plans for Trump and Putin to meet.
President Putin has rejected calls for an immediate ceasefire and also refused to make concessions as part of a peace deal with Ukraine. The Russian government continues to demand that Ukraine cede territory in any deal to end the war.
After President Trump spoke by phone with President Putin on October 16, he announced plans to hold talks in Budapest to reach an agreement to end the war. The choice of Budapest as the venue for the talks was controversial. Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban is one of the few European Union leaders who maintains close ties with Russia.
A face-to-face meeting between President Trump and President Putin in Alaska in August failed to advance peace negotiations as much as President Trump had hoped. President Trump said a meeting in Hungary would be held within the next two weeks.
The day after his phone conversation with President Putin, President Trump welcomed Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky to the White House on October 17 for a meeting, but President Trump did not intend to respond to President Zelensky’s request for long-range Tomahawk missiles to support the war effort.
Reuters reported that the private meeting between Trump and Zelensky was controversial, with the president repeatedly using profanity and pressuring Zelensky to accept some of Russia’s demands.
But President Zelenskiy painted the talks as a success because they ended with President Trump publicly supporting Kiev’s long-standing position of a ceasefire on the current front.
Contact Joey Garrison at X @joeygarrison
Contributed by Reuters.
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