President Donald J. Trump said Tuesday that a planned summit with Russian President Vladimir Putin is on hold, calling it premature given the lack of progress toward ending the war in Ukraine.
Speaking at the White House, Trump said he would unveil his “new thinking” on the conflict within two days, signaling a recalibration of U.S. diplomacy with both Moscow and Kyiv.
“I don’t want to have a wasted meeting. I don’t want to have a waste of time till I’ll see what happens,” Trump said, explaining his decision to delay the second Trump-Putin meeting initially expected to take place in Budapest. “Putin wants the war to end,” Trump added. “Zelensky wants it to end. I think it’s going to end.”
The remarks followed confirmation from the White House that no summit with Putin is currently scheduled. The decision came after Secretary of State and National Security Adviser Marco Rubio held a tense call with Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov on Monday.
According to administration officials, the call revealed that Moscow remains unwilling to compromise, maintaining its long-held demand that Ukraine surrender full control of the Donbas region as part of any peace settlement.
After briefing the president, Rubio advised that another summit at this stage would be unlikely to produce meaningful progress. “Russia’s position has remained largely unchanged,” Lavrov acknowledged Tuesday, insisting that Moscow’s demands were consistent with those it made during the previous Trump-Putin meeting in Alaska two months ago.
Lavrov also said Russia still prefers a comprehensive peace agreement over a temporary cease-fire.
A senior administration official confirmed that Lavrov’s remarks only underscored what Washington already believed: “Russia is still not willing to make a deal.” Still, Trump aides said the president’s latest call with Putin suggested some openness to renewed talks. “Putin signaled he was open to discussing matters that could bridge the divide,” one official said, leaving the door open for a future meeting “once the groundwork is right.”
Trump has long described the Ukraine conflict as one that “should be solved quickly,” expressing confidence that his personal diplomacy could bring both sides to the table. After the Alaska summit, he had hoped Putin and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky would meet directly, but no such talks occurred.
Frustrated by the stalemate, Trump has redoubled efforts to broker an agreement, pointing to his success in achieving a cease-fire in Gaza as evidence of what he calls a “results-driven” approach to foreign policy.
Yet his patience with Moscow appears to have thinned in recent weeks. He has criticized Russia for prolonging the conflict and even considered authorizing shipments of long-range Tomahawk missiles to Ukraine—a move he ultimately set aside after speaking with Putin last week.
During his meeting with Zelensky at the White House, Trump emphasized that his top priority is “to end the war.” He urged Kyiv to consider a freeze along current battle lines, a position that Ukraine has intermittently supported but that falls short of Russia’s territorial ambitions. Trump noted that “Russia controls about 78 percent of the Donbas,” underscoring the challenges facing any potential deal.
Both Rubio and Lavrov are expected to attend an upcoming Association of Southeast Asian Nations summit in Malaysia, though U.S. officials said no formal meetings are planned. They added, however, that “discussions are ongoing” to determine whether conditions might eventually warrant a Trump-Putin summit—one that, as the president said, “won’t be a waste of time.”
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