‘No deal’ in Trump-Putin Summit

According to Politico, president Donald Trump meets with Russia's President Vladimir Putin at Joint Base Elmendorf-Richardson, Alaska, on Friday, Aug. 15, 2025.  Trump brought Secretary of State Marco Rubio and Special Envoy Steve Witkoff with him into the room with Putin.

“We didn’t get there, but we have a very good chance of getting there,” Trump said, declaring the talks “extremely productive” and that “many points were agreed to.” But he acknowledged that there was no progress on “one big one,” seemingly an allusion to the ceasefire in Ukraine.

After suggesting in the 48 hours leading up to the Alaska summit that his goal was a second, trilateral meeting that would include Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy, Trump, and Putin, Trump and Putin walked away without any concrete plans to meet again.

When Trump was telling Putin he’d “probably see you again very soon,” Putin replied: “Next time in Moscow.” Trump called it an “interesting” proposal and said that he could “see it possibly happening.”

Trump, as he promised he would, told reporters that he would soon call Zelenskyy and European counterparts to fill them in. “It’s ultimately up to them,” he said.

Arrangements for a call with NATO allies were taking place shortly after Trump left the stage, according to two NATO officials, with hopes of scheduling one within hours.

Putin expressed a willingness to resolve the war in a way that addresses Ukraine’s security concerns as well as Russia’s. But his comments, referencing the “fundamental threats to our security” posed by Ukraine and his demand that a settlement must “eliminate all the primary causes of the conflict,” made clear he was not ready to concede much of anything.

“I would like to hope that the agreement that we’ve reached together will help bring us closer to that goal and will pave the path towards peace in Ukraine,” Putin said.

Zelenskyy to meet Trump in Washington on Monday. The visit comes after the high-stakes Putin-Trump summit in Alaska that failed to bring a ceasefire in the Ukraine war.