Welcome to Meet the Press Now. I am Kristen Welker in Washington. You've been watching our breaking news coverage of the historic summit between President Trump and Russian President Vladimir Putin. As the two leaders meet for discussions about the path towards ending the war in Ukraine, right now the two leaders are continuing to meet behind closed doors.
But this was the scene just moments ago. Take a look. It was supposed to be a one-on-one meeting, meaning just President Trump and President Putin. But you can see here, Secretary of State Marco Rubio, Special Envoy Steve Wickoff, there right alongside President Trump, President Putin also there with top officials.
Both leaders ignoring shouted questions largely from reporters. They are expected to hold an expanded working lunch with their larger delegations before a potential joint news conference. President Trump has said he plans to call President Valencia immediately after this meeting wraps the Ukrainian president was not invited to the summit. Well, the two leaders didn't meet formally one-on-one.
They did share a private moment, President Trump greeting President Putin with some pomp, which included a U.S. military flyover, the Trump administration rolling out the figurative and literal red carpet for the Russian leader, flanked by F-22 fighter jets. The two leaders then got into the beast, that's the president's car, together to head over to the meeting location. You can see Putin even laughing there as the two drove away in an interview with Fox News on Air Force One on his way to Alaska, President Trump laid out his expectations, even signaling.
He could walk away from these talks. I'd like to see a ceasefire. I wouldn't be thrilled if I didn't get it, but everyone says, you're not going to get the ceasefire. It'll take place on the second meeting.
The second meeting is going to be very, but I'm not going to be happy with that. So we'll see what happens. I won't be happy if I walk away without some form of a ceasefire. During me now, our team of reporters to start us off, NBC News Senior White House correspondent Garrett Hake is in Anchorage, Alaska.
NBC News Chief International Correspondent, Keir Simmons, is in London. And with me right here on set is NBC News Chief Washington Correspondent and Chief Foreign Affairs correspondent Andrea Mitchell and Evelyn Farkas, Executive Director of the McCain Institute and former Assistant Secretary of Defense for Russia and Ukraine, thanks to all of you for being here and starting us off. Garrett, I have to start with you in Anchorage, Alaska. You were there when President Trump, when President Putin arrived, we saw that extraordinary made-for-TV moment when the two leaders greeted each other on the red carpet.
So far, Garrett, what have been your biggest takeaways? Well, look, the President has avoided for so long setting expectations for this summit, but now it feels like we're in a situation where he probably owns this conflict and his negotiations much more than he perhaps intended or certainly did before this moment. For 207 days, he's pushed down the line what has been a campaign promise to end this war on day one. But now, given this pomp and circumstance, the B2 fly over, the handshakes, the private ride in the B, something that's not done often with close allies, let alone an adversary on the scale of Russia.
The President has involved himself so much further in this conflict, but I think whatever we see today is going to take on greater import, you know, on that same conversation on Air Force One, the President talked about severe economic consequences. He was pressed about the idea of peacekeeping force of some kind in Ukraine. The stakes are only going to rise, I think, for this moment onward as we get through this evening and whatever happens next, especially if there is this second meeting, which has been probably the only goalpost that the White House has been willing to stick to over the last couple of days for judging success and what happens here today in Alaska. Garrett, you and I have talked so much about how the President's tone expectation setting has changed in recent weeks, in recent days, in terms of the way he's talked about Vladimir Putin several weeks ago, saying he was disappointed, now shifting his tone, saying he thinks he does in fact want peace, setting the expectation, saying he wants a ceasefire agreement, but also saying the only real progress is going to come in a second follow-up meeting.
What do you make of the fact that his language, his tone, to some extent has shifted so much? There's a couple of things going on here. I mean, the President has clearly both publicly and privately been frustrated with Vladimir Putin, who is essentially on his own, keeping the President from fulfilling one of his key campaign promises, which was to bring this war to a close on day one, as I said, with more than 200 days past that. And so we saw him shift his focus to frustration with Zelensky, to frustration with Putin.
I think today you're seeing a President who, you know, we talk about his reality TV career, but also had a career in hospitality. He wants to be warm. He wants these other foreign leaders to like him. He wants to create that personal relationship from which he can then strike a deal.
And so how he moved forward here, I think, is going to be very fascinating to watch. Does he continue with that frustration with Putin? Is he willing to involve the Europeans more? And how do they get to that second meeting?
Look, the President has inserted himself very far into this conflict, and the prospect of being the one to bring into a close is something that I think appeals to him a great deal personally, securing his place in history. It's the kind of thing that he does care about on a personal level. Can he bring it across the finish line, or is this another thing, is going to get delayed and push it out and push it out with these ever shifting goalposts? We're just going to find out in real time.
You're absolutely right. This is all evolving in real time, Garrett. And we saw there another evolution. The fact that this went from an initial meeting that was supposed to be President Trump and President Putin, and now they're joined by two top officials for President Trump's part by his Secretary of State, Marco Rubio, and his special envoy, Steve Whitcough.
It was Steve Whitcough who had the meeting with President Putin that led to this meeting with President Trump. The relationship and the significance of those two men being in the room. Yeah, these are important figures, but for different reasons. Whitcough, like Trump, comes in without a traditional background in diplomacy or in foreign policy, but he has someone who has the implicit trust of the President.
They have been friends for decades. Whitcough has told me he thinks of himself as Donald Trump's best friend. He's a gut check for the President, and someone whose opinion he will value and trust above those of many other people, perhaps even including the men sitting to the President's immediate left, Marco Rubio, his National Security Advisor and Secretary of State. Rubio's value in the President's eyes has only increased since Rubio joined his administration, but Rubio, remember, started with much more traditional views on foreign policy, much more of a traditional Russia hockey, someone who's described Vladimir Putin as a butcher, and someone who I think will be more naturally distrustful of the Russian position.
So you could have something of a good cop-bad-cop situation here with Rubio and Whitcough as the two people in the room, but there are people whose opinions, ultimately, after this meeting wraps, whenever that is, whom the President will actually value their opinions above those of many of his other aides. Yeah, great reporting on analysis, and Garrett, hey, continue to watch it all unfold in real time together. Thank you for starting us off, Cara. Let me turn to you now, those extraordinary images, the warm greeting between President Trump and President Putin, President Putin chuckling in the beast, a former Republican U.S.
official telling me, boy, Putin's having a strong first inning. What are European officials making of these initial images? What's the response been so far? Well, stunned silence, honestly.
European officials, European leaders, Ukrainians will be watching with their hearts and their mouth, frankly. And that isn't to say that necessarily, how this begins is how this ends this summit. So there's many hours ago, but certainly that moment, President Putin sitting in the beast, smiling and laughing, looking out the window, and just think about that he would have been aware of the photographers there. He's looking out the window as he laughs.
He is somebody who understands the choreography of these kinds of things just as much as President Trump does. That is an image that will echo through history, given how many people have died and have been wounded as a result of President Putin's decision to invade Ukraine. The question of how that came about is still hanging, because then so we are reading Russian journalists who are saying that there was a car for President Putin on the time out waiting for him. It's not confirmed that it wasn't, it was the case that he necessarily, the President necessarily in the end, intended to get in that car.
But one of our Russia experts, one of our producers has looked at the video and can see Russian plates on the car, can see that Russian presidential car there. So how was it that President Putin ended up in the vehicle with President Trump? I'm dwelling on this because it is the opening moments, the opening minutes after six years of the two men being together, because they appear to have been in the vehicle, perhaps without translators, certainly perhaps without notetakers. And in the past, during the first Trump administration, moments when President Trump was with President Putin on their own, maybe just with a Russian interpreter, that those moments have been incredibly controversial.
And I'll just tell you this too. I have spoken with President Putin in English, not on camera in the past, on some occasions. He has English. It is stilted.
There is video of President Putin speaking in English during the run-up to the World Cup held in Russia, for example, or at Buckingham Palace, this is a long time ago now, making a speech in front of the Queen. But from my experience, President Putin's English is not fluent. So it will have been, maybe it just will have been nicer tees. Who knows?
In a sense, that is the point. Are we going to know what these two men said to each other? And the opening moments of this absolutely crucial summit. That is the point, because it effectively became a small bilateral meeting in and of itself in the back of the beast, the presidential vehicle.
Cures stand by for me. I want to go now to Andrea Mitchell. Andrea, can you put those stunning optics into perspective? As Cures said, they are worth focusing on because these are the opening moments of this historic summit.
And you saw Putin with that big grin, certainly European allies watching very closely. European allies, and Vladimir Zelensky, and all of the mothers and fathers and spouses in Ukraine, Richard Engel reporting so memorably, compassionately, yesterday on a funeral in Ukraine of a young soldier and the mother sobbing over the grave, the long line of blue and gold, blue and yellow flags waiting for the next coffin to be lowered. Just to say, you and I were in Helsinki, we sat next to each other and we watched that unfold. The opening moments, the opening moments in Helsinki when the two men stood next to each other and the camaraderie was palpable and there was the validation in words of the Putin lies about interference, the attempted interference in 2016, which the president of the United States accepted and invalidated his own intelligence agencies.
So these things are so important. I had a flashback when I was thinking about today and watching that unfold, thinking about the Russian and Ukraine experts, the analysts at the NSC, at the State Department, who no longer work there after the doge cutbacks and the rifts, the desks have been decimated and to a certain extent, though, is also at the CIA. The people who did not go into planning as one of our colleagues here, Evelyn Farkis, who were days at the Pentagon, the planning of a summit beforehand, what will this, what do you do if this happens? And I had a flashback to 1985 in Geneva when the first meeting between an American president and a Soviet leader, Gorbachev in Reagan, and I'm standing there in the cold in Geneva, watching Ronald Reagan, he had arrived earlier in the beast and had an overcoat on, but when he came down those steps to meet a 25-year younger man, Gorbachev in his 50s, Ronald Reagan was in his suit and Gorbachev came out wearing a coat and a muffler and a hat.
And that was a very careful, deliberate decision by the advisers to make the older man look younger and the younger man look older. And they also did that walkabout down to, you know, down, around by themselves. And that was the one-on-one that sealed the relationship. So these are important moments.
They're important moments and Evelyn boy, Andrea, capture so well the history and the extent to which these moments are usually so carefully choreographed. We know that, yes, there was this red carpet roll out, but we know that things are also shifting around in real time, like the fact that there are now two top advisers with each of these leaders in this initial bilateral. And just as of last night, I spoke with the U.S. official who said they are still planning a number of things.
So what do you make of what we have witnessed so far, and what's unfolded so far? I mean, I feel like I have a split screen, you know, in my brain, because on the one hand, based on what Andrea said and understanding diplomacy, you have to show respect to a leader that you're negotiating with, right? So President Trump is doing that and he's trying to establish some kind of camaraderie rather than coming down hard. He said, I want to make sure that I can maintain a line of communication with Vladimir Putin.
He wants to be different, although it's not that different from other presidents who have tried this. On the other hand, I think to myself, my God, this is a war criminal. This is a guy who has a warrant out for his arrest by the International Criminal Court. The only reason we didn't arrest him is because we're not party to that treaty, but he has, you know, murdered, not only Ukrainians, but every day there are about a thousand plus Russians dying or getting injured on the battlefield because of this man.
He's kidnapped, of course, that's why he has indictment. I can go on and on. He's a war criminal. So the other part of me is why do we have to roll out the red carpet for a war criminal?
Why can't we just have him come inside the base and just do it in an austere, kind of, you know, tent or military building? Here, you'd have to imagine, as President Zelensky watches this unfold, that those are some of the questions he is asking, he, of course, was not invited to this summit. It's our understanding that President Trump wanted to have him at the summit, and yet President Putin wouldn't agree to that. So you have heard President Trump consistently throughout the course of this week put the focus on the next meeting that will include, he says, President Zelensky.
Do you believe that if this meeting goes well that President Zelensky will be ready to get on a plane, whether it be in the next several hours or several days? Well, I would make one point that the actual meeting itself turned out to be six officials. So you had President Trump and Secretary of State Rubio and Ambassador President Trump's Envoy Steve Wickoff on the one side, and then you had President Putin and the Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov and a very senior Russian diplomat, Yuri Ushikov, on the other side. There weren't, there are, on both sides, economic advisers, trade advisers, they weren't in that room.
So does that mean then that the opening conversation is about Ukraine and is about a ceasefire and is about the kinds of things that the Ukrainians and the Europeans have said should be at the heart of this before you start to talk about anything else. Another point I think is worth noting, Kristen, is that just think back to the extraordinary optics in the Trump first term of President Trump with Kim Jong Un, and how much bond on me there was there, and how history-making those images were, and then President Trump walked away. And so I think, and I'll tell you, from speaking to Russian officials, they know this very, very well. President Trump is unpredictable.
We know that. And so we should just note that in the past, extraordinary images like these at the beginning of a summit have not meant that the summit went well, not necessarily with President Trump. Here, it's such an important point that you bring up, and I'm glad that you bring it up, because Andrea, we have heard President Trump say he will know within the meeting of President Putin whether he's serious about this initial ceasefire agreement that President Trump must do. If he's serious about a longer peace deal, and you do have to think back to that moment when President Trump did walk away from Kim Jong Un, he held that solo news conference and said he wasn't ready to make a deal, unpredictability is part of how President Trump governs, and he would argue it's part of how he gets deals done.
The difference here, though, is that President Trump does not know the details of Ukraine, whether, you know, what villages, what cities, what the military situation is. And even to be discussing territorial swaps is really concerning to the Ukrainians and the Europeans, because Putin is a master of this. He is the former KGB commander, the former KGB leader in East Germany. He has studied this.
This land is the land that he wants to be part of the Soviet Union, the expanded Russia, and restore it the way the shirt or t-shirt or whatever it was that Lavrov, the Wiley foreign minister, was wearing today to indicate the CCP. I mean, that is such a throwback and such an important signal. So that was a trolling of the US side as well, and certainly the Ukrainian and the Europeans. And in a moment that is so high stakes, we pay attention to every single detail, and the fact that Sergey Lavrov would show up with that shirt on Evelyn Farkas, so many people took note of that, essentially sending a signal, reminding people of the USSR, Andrea makes the point about the discussion of land swaps.
President Trump talked about it this week. It set off alarm bells for European officials. He then had a call with European leaders with President Zelensky. He promised them, based on our reporting, that he would not negotiate territory without President Zelensky in the room.
But the question is, and I think this is what Andrea has gotten to, when you talk about President Putin as a negotiator going into one of these rooms, he's a former KGB officer. He knows how to throw people off of their intended strategy. Yeah, I mean, I'm sure Putin will try to get his maximalist aims. You know, he'll demand, as he always has, those two provinces, he will demand that Ukraine cannot join NATO and that there can be no NATO forces to enforce any kind of future agreement.
I think, however, if he can't distract President Trump by talking about arms control or future business deals, because I can imagine on the tarmac, he might have said, we'll make a deal. Let's talk business, you know, and President Trump would smile and laugh at that. And I would imagine that President Putin would try to distract him with that. But if he can't, if President Trump is adamant that we have to have some agreement today on Ukraine, I think he'll probably agree to a ceasefire, but I'm here to tell you that he will also break it.
You will break it if we don't continue. If President Trump doesn't continue the pressure, military pressure and economic. Andrea, you have covered so many ceasefire agreements. We've talked so much about a ceasefire.
To Evelyn's point, ceasefire's are historically very tentative and tenuous and fragile. Right. And we see that every day in the Middle East, we see that tragically all over the world. Here it is really a warning signal because people in Ukraine, for good reason, do not trust a Putin ceasefire.
He took Crimea in 2014 and there was no pushback and that's not on Donald Trump, but the fact is that bit by bit, and Zelinsky in last summer's incursion into the first incursion into Russian territory, thought it would give him some leverage at a future negotiation, but they've lost most of that territory already. I mean, Russia has been on the offensive every day and these intentions about a ceasefire could have been signaled if they were positive constructive consent intentions going into these talks. If he had not been advancing as aggressively as brutally as they have been for the last two weeks. Yeah.
Well, and here, let me quickly, we do have sound of President Trump talking about these land swaps. I want to play it a little bit and get your reaction on the other side. This is from Air Force One today. Are the territorial swaps on the table?
Will you be discussing that? They'll be discussed, but I've got to let Ukraine make that decision. I think they'll make a proper decision, but I'm not here to negotiate for Ukraine. I'm here to get him in a table and I think you have two sides, Vladimir Putin wanted to take all of Ukraine.
If I wasn't president, he would right now be taking all of Ukraine. Here, what do you make of his latest comments about the territory in Ukraine that Russia has illegally claimed? Well, fact check, Vladimir Putin did want to take all of Ukraine, but it isn't because President Trump is president that he hasn't taken all of Ukraine in recent months. He hasn't been able to.
Russia has been throwing blood and treasure at the front line, and it's but has been inching forward, as Andrea says, but only inching forward, honestly. I do think that President Putin believes that the Ukrainian front line could collapse. He's very likely wrong about that. You never know him, or he's very likely wrong about that, but that I suspect will be will be driving him.
Another point here, there has been confusion over exactly what the territory possibilities were. Some great reporting in the Wall Street Journal suggesting that it wasn't clear to the Europeans what the Russians said about Zapparitsya and Kursong, whether the Russians suggested that they would withdraw there, or whether in fact that wasn't part of an offer that was kind of privately made to Steve Wickov in order to get this meeting to happen. And that's one of the reasons why actually we should be welcoming, seeing the Secretary of State and Steve Wickov in that room with President Trump up against, if you like, three Russians, President Putin and two others who have just, as Andrea pointed out, just have so much experience. So there's that piece.
Another piece too, the Russians have been signaling some questions about how this goes. So Yuri Ushikov, the senior diplomat who's in that room with President Putin and President Trump right now, was asked by a Russian reporter whether there'll be another meeting and he dismissed that and said, well, let's just get through this meeting first. So I think that the Russians are going to themselves take a litmus test of what they can get from this. But here's the point, and you've made it very well.
They've already got so much, haven't they? Yes. Just from the optics of this, even if they walk away with no deal. It's such a profound point, Keir, for you to make and highlight, and Evelyn, it speaks to this broader question.
What does each side want? President Trump has said what he wants. He wants a ceasefire agreement. He wants another meeting.
Does Russia want the same or is President Putin simply there to turn down the temperature with the U.S. to try to get some sanctions removed, to try to get a new start agreement, nuclear start agreement? President Putin is there to stall for time, Kristin. So I love Keir's description because they're just, and Andrea said as well, just inching forward.
But I think that Putin may well be told by his generals and his intelligence officers that they do have a chance to break through. In any event, he thinks time is on his side. Time suddenly wasn't on his side when President Trump seemed like he was getting impatient and he was going to put these secondary sanctions on him. So he said, hey, why don't we meet?
This is a stalling tactic. And a ceasefire, unfortunately, without additional pressure, and frankly, really on the battlefield, the sanctions don't matter as much as sending arms to Ukraine, putting pressure on Ukraine, is hitting refineries. Ukraine is holding its ground. We could do a lot more to help them and put pressure on Putin.
Andrea, a final point as we wrap up this initial segment. Well, is the point of sanctions, again, today, the President Donneur for his one flying out, was that what would be the severe consequences if you don't think that Putin is serious about peace and a ceasefire? And he said, extremely severe, extremely severe, economic. Well, that's the secondary sanctions, but there are so many other reasons why those are complicated, especially against China.
The President is trying to maintain a relationship with China. He has twice delayed his 90-day deadline for even putting tariffs bilateral tariffs on China because of those minerals, the minerals that the US needs for batteries, for electric vehicles and all sorts of equipment. The President has given an exemption to video to sell chips to China, so he has done a lot of things that signal that he's not looking for a confrontation with China and to crack down on China buying Russian oil and India to a lesser extent, Brazil, which is already tariff to death. It's a big step.
They've already opposed unfreezing the Russian assets, 300 billion dollars that could be unfrozen for to rebuild Ukraine. There's a lot of steps that he could have taken so far. Well, you're absolutely right about that, and that is why this moment as we watch and wait to see what happens with the threat, potentially some more actions will see how it all unfolds. Evelyn, Andrea, thank you.
And Keir, thank you so much for getting us started. We really appreciate it. Great conversation joining me now. Former US Ambassador to NATO, Ambassador Dollar, thank you so much for joining us.
We really appreciate it. What do you make of everything that we have witnessed so far, this red carpet rollout, the fact that President Putin rode in the beast with President Trump, of course, that grin that we saw. And now they are having this meeting joined by top advisors. It really is quite an extraordinary scene.
Here you have a man who 11 years ago decided to invade a neighboring country, sees part of the Crimea, and then continue to push for an annexing part of his neighbor, then a full-scale invasion just three and a half years ago that has led to over well over a million casualties, mostly Russian, but also lots of Ukrainians, a man who on a daily basis is shooting rockets and drones at cities and departments and places where civilians live, to be treated as if he's some kind of, not only an equal, but some kind of person who deserves to be treated as if he's some kind of statesman with the red carpets, with B-tube bombers flying over, and sitting in the beast, one of the most guarded places for the President of the United States, and there is a grinning cat-like, I would say, of Vladimir Putin looking out the window and telling people, look where I'm at, I'm in the President's car, what do you think? This is not a good omen, if you care about the future of security in Ukraine, which is threatened by one person and one person only, and that's the one who's walking down the red carpet with the President of the United States, so it's a sobering sight, I must say. Ambassador, given that the initial meeting went from President Trump to President Putin, they've now expanded that, so you have Secretary of State Marco Rubio in the room, you have special envoy Steve Whitcoff in the room, does that give you any more hope that this could actually lead to the temporary ceasefire agreement that President Trump is looking for? Perhaps I'm glad that Secretary of State slash national security adviser Marco Rubio is in the room, he is a student of these kinds of negotiations, although he's of course never been in one directly with the President of Russia, but he has a long track record of understanding that we know that Steve Whitcoff may well be the President's best friend, but he's not one of the best negotiators, as Keir mentioned a little while ago, a great confusion about what Steve Whitcoff was learning from Vladimir Putin in their last, one of the fifth time that they met in Moscow, so there is some reassurance that perhaps no big missteps will be had, but let's remember why this meeting is taking place, it's not taking place first and foremost to resolve the crisis in Ukraine, it is taking place on Vladimir Putin's side because what he wants is a normalization of relations with the United States, and on President Trump's part because he wants an end to the war, not because he thinks the war affects American security or indeed that he cares about European or Ukrainian security, but because he wants to be seen as someone who can end the war, who promised to do so in 24 hours, he failed in doing so in the first six plus months, and he wants an end to the war.
Those are two reasons that in fact have very little to do with Ukraine, which is why Ukrainians watching this at home are holding their breath in the hope that nothing bad happens behind their back. Well, and let's pick up right there, the fact that President Zelensky is not a part of this initial summit, we know that President Trump wanted him to be President Putin would not meet with President Zelensky, you've heard President Trump throughout the course of this week put so much focus on a follow up meeting, basically downplaying the chances of any real breakthrough here today, and saying the real progress will be made when President Zelensky and President Putin are in a room together, President Trump said he assumes he'll be there as well. What is the significance of the fact that President Zelensky is not there? Well, not only is it a huge significance that the victim of this war is not at the table, it is also significant that the meeting is taking place nevertheless, you're right that President Trump wanted to have a meeting that included both President Putin and President Zelensky, President Putin said no, and rather than the President of the United States, well, you know what, if you don't want to come with Zelensky, then I'm not going to have a meeting with you, and I'm going to put those severe economic sanctions on that I promised to do last Friday, and you'll have to take care of yourself.
That's not what President Trump did. In fact, he said, oh, you know what, we'll just have another meeting so that we can see if there can be a meeting with Vladimir Zelensky. It's quite remarkable that in some ways, President Putin seems to have played President Trump to get this meeting, even though this was a meeting that was supposed to be about Ukraine, and with Ukraine, and to suggest that I'm going to fly to Alaska have a meeting, particularly this kind of reception with Vladimir Putin, only to make sure that we have a meeting next time in which the Ukrainian President is involved, suggests that perhaps the stronger person here is Mr Putin, rather than Mr Trump. All right, well, a lot to unpack as we watch and wait to see what happens next.
Former Ambassador Evo Dollar, we really appreciate your perspective and expertise today. Thank you so much for joining us. My pleasure. Coming up, what's at stake as President Trump's and President Putin's face-to-face continues to get underway and the high stakes decisions that could shape Ukraine's future, the live coverage continues straight ahead right here on the press now.
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Visit nbcnews.com slash XFINITY for full offer terms and details. And I notice he's bringing a lot of business people from Russia. And that's good. I like that because they want to do business but they're not doing business until we get the worst out.
One year ago we were dead as a doernail. And then we have the hottest country and he wants a piece of that because this country is not on economically. Welcome back. Speaking on Air Force One on his way to Alaska for this historic summit as President Trump and President Putin have been meeting for just over an hour so far.
Back with me and I encourage Alaska, NBC News, White House correspondent, Garrett Hake. So Garrett, I'm starting to get reaction coming in a trickle of reaction, mostly to say we're watching and waiting to see what will happen next, some consternation over that big grin that we saw from President Putin. What are you hearing? And what we just heard from President Trump was quite notable too that we're not doing business until this war is solved.
Yeah, look, I mean, President Trump has talked publicly for quite some time here that he thinks Russia should be back again part of the global world order here. He's criticized G7 countries for making it the G7 by kicking Russia out. And as long suggested that, you know, the Ukraine war could have been avoided or that could be better ended by bringing Russia back into negotiating table, that's something that Vladimir Putin probably likes to hear every time he hears it and probably like to hear the President put this summit today in the broader context of restoring economic relationships. That's something that Putin wants as well.
But with Donald Trump, you know, everything is transactional and the economy is a tool. And you see that most obviously in the way in which he deploys tariffs. But I think the way that he thinks about this that, you know, if what Russia really wants is reintegration with the United States, that could potentially be a carrot or a stick to end this war. Although, Kristin, if he wants to use it as a stick, the tools that are available to him to punish Russia's economy, almost certainly punishing the American economy too.
You know, he's already punished India for buying Russian oil. The only people who buy more Russian oil than the Indians are the Chinese. Does he really want to go down a route that might further antagonize China while he's also trying to make a trade deal with them, you know, offload TikTok? There's so much involved with China.
I say all this to get back to the point that it's not just European leaders who are watching this meeting today with Bated Brat, it really is the whole world because these issues are so integrated. They absolutely are. It would take thank you so much for sticking with us throughout the hour with your great reporting. We really appreciate it.
We'll be watching you tonight on Nightly News. Coming up after the break, all eyes on Alaska. More on the diplomatic fallout from today's summit is President Trump tests his foreign influence with widespread consequences for U.S. allies and adversaries.
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Visit today.com slash XFINITY for full offer terms and details. Welcome back. We're watching the high stakes summit between President Trump and President Putin in Alaska today. The two leaders talking about the path to ending the war in Ukraine.
Let's bring in former U. U.S. Ambassador. We also serve as President Trump's Special Representative for Ukraine negotiations during Mr.
Trump's first term. Ambassador, thank you so much for joining us. We really appreciate it. It's pleasure to be with you.
Thank you. Well, it is wonderful to have you here. Your insights, you were of course part of the first Trump administration, that first summit between President Trump and Putin. How do you think today's summit compares?
Well, I think that both leaders have very strong objectives here. Back in 2018, I think it was a little bit more, you know, hoping to build cooperation. There was, I think, an effort by President Trump to show that there was just this Russia hoax of attacking him. It wasn't in Putin's pocket, but that he could be a deal maker.
He could be a great leader who could cut deals with Russia. So that was back then. Now, and he was taking tough policies toward Russia at the time, too, remember that. But now you have a situation where Trump really wants to see this war in Ukraine ended, and he is asking for an immediate ceasefire.
Putin is rejecting that. He has maximalist demands, and he's trying to change the subject. Trump's going to try to keep him focused on the ceasefire and say there's a pot of gold at the end of the rainbow if you do. And meanwhile, Putin is going to try to dangle riches for the United States and U.S.
businesses and Russian resources if Trump convinces Ukraine to end the war. So they're really talking past each other. They're not going to get much out of this meeting. The most they'll have is a conditional agreement to another meeting with the President, and let's be included as well.
But then those conditions will keep changing, and Putin will never say that they are actually satisfied. Well, let me follow up with you on that point, because it's an important one. If what comes out of this is a conditional ceasefire, some type of conditional agreement. Would that, in essence, be a victory for President Putin?
I spoke with one Western official who said there cannot be strings attached at the end of this meeting. Right. I can't see any agreement partly because President Trump can't execute an agreement. It depends on Ukraine to execute any agreement, meaning Ukraine has to agree with Putin.
So I don't see that. I don't see a conditional ceasefire because Putin's not going to agree to any kind of ceasefire. All I can see Putin doing here is saying he'd agree to me again, and maybe even me it was a Linsky, but some conditions have to be met first. It seems like this summit came together somewhat in a last-minute fashion.
But can you take us inside President Trump's preparation process? Because as we've been discussing throughout the hour, part of what he would argue makes him a good dealmaker is that he continues to keep people guessing about what he's going to do or say next. How does he prepare for a conversation of this enormity? Right.
Well, President Trump, especially in the second term, is really the one calling the shots. He is making the decisions day by day. What does he want to do? Does he want to call Zelensky?
Does he want to meet with Putin? Does he want to do that zoom with European leaders? He's doing this day by day, and he's doing it based on his instincts and his personal relationships. So it is very, very different from a normal administration where you have policy, development, coordinated clearly at a sub-cabinet in the cabinet level.
Everything is gamed out. Second and third-order consequences are gamed out. This is all very personalized diplomacy and personalized decision-making from President Trump based on his sense of who he's dealing with and what it takes to get a deal. You said something really important, I think, and critical to what may be happening right now in this conversation between President Trump and President Putin, which is the President Putin will try to change the subject.
He is going to try to talk about his agenda items, potentially doing business with the U.S., getting the U.S. to roll back some of the sanctions, maybe even talking about a new nuclear arms agreement. How much might that cloud the conversation when you have Secretary Rubio sitting there and Special Envoy Steve Whitkoff, could they essentially help to rein the conversation back in? Well, I'm not sure they're going to be speaking up very much.
I think it's going to be Trump and Putin who do the talking. And I think that Trump will be willing to listen, he'll be interested in that. And it's just a matter of Trump being consistent and saying, okay, that's all very interesting, we'd love to do that. But you've got to end the war first.
I hope that Trump can just be consistent like that. Well, we will have to wait to find out the answer to that critical question for my ambassador Kurt Ropor. Thank you so much for being here. We really appreciate it.
And so to come. Thank you. The politics of today's hotly anticipated talks as the Trump administration faces multiple challenges at home and abroad. You're watching with the press now.
Welcome back. We've been watching the Trump Putin summit unfold in Alaska today to help us break down the political impact. You mean now is our great panel, Susan Page, Washington Bureau Chief at USA Today, Cornell Belcher Democratic Strategist and an NBC News political analyst, and Matt Gorman, former Senior Communications Advisor to the Tim Scott Presidential Campaign, thanks to all of you for being here on what is really a historic Friday, Susan Page, let me start with you. Trump said he would know if President Putin was serious about getting a deal done in the first two or three minutes of meeting with him.
We're now in minute 75. What do you make of what we've seen so far? You know, the clock started when they shook hands on a red carpet and then had a flyover and then got in the backseat together of the beast. I was trying to think back in all the years I've covered the White House.
If I've ever seen even an Allied leader in the backseat of the beast, that tells us that they're going to have something to announce. They're going to have a guarantee. They'll have a joint news conference. They'll have something to announce.
I don't know what it will be. They will hail it as a big victory. And we'll see whether that then plays out. I think they did make a judgment in the first two minutes and the judgment they made was they're going to make it even.
Well, it's so extraordinary, Matt Gorman, the fact that this went from being a one-on-one meeting with President Trump and President Putin. They now have their top advisors with them. They have state Marco Rubio, special envoy Steve Whitkoff, these images, Matt are a reminder. He is not just a president.
He's a former reality TV star and producer. This is someone who understands the power of these optics all while trying to get this ceasefire. Certainly. Look, I will say this.
He's not even the first Russian president to be in the beast. To be sure, better than 2010 was written in the beast with President Obama. We've had others than 10 days of action since Oave, but I will say this. You're absolutely right.
I think it's very interesting. I think Whitkoff is particularly interesting to me. Are there things they can go back to in Whitkoff and met with Putin just a couple of days ago? They can refer back to either preliminary agreements or things like that.
That told me a little bit as well. But also, look, I think what he said about Ukraine on the plane was also very notable to me. I met with European officials earlier this week, and they were very nervous about Trump giving away territory. The fact that he was very saying that Ukraine's territory, Ukraine's to give away in being a little bit more passed on that, told me that he is a little bit in line with more the European line on that.
Well, and I've been talking to officials who have said the same, which is that when he spoke with European leaders, when he spoke with President Zelensky, he guaranteed them, Cornell, that he would not negotiate territory in this first meeting. But today, in talking to some sources, Western sources, they say they are watching all of this unfold with some trepidation. Well, I think that's right. Look, I think we don't often have a lot of political fallout and political stakes are very high in our country for electoral because for better or worse, Americans don't necessarily go on foreign policy.
I don't think this is important for the president because, look, Pew came out with a research yesterday that showed on nearly 6% of Americans that not have a lot of confidence in his decision making ability around the Ukrainian war. So I do think with his falling, pulling numbers around every other issue, I do think he does need a victory here. What does that victory look like? We're not quite sure, especially if he's giving away territory, territory without Ukraine at the table.
Absolutely. And all of this is happening. We should remind our viewers against the backdrop of ongoing violence. President Trump was asked about that aboard Air Force One.
I want to take a listen to a little bit of how he responded to a question today. We saw that Russia continued its violence into Ukraine last night, launching even more drones. What did you make of that? I think they're trying to negotiate.
He's trying to set a stage. I mean, in his mind, that helps him make a better deal. It actually hurts him. But in his mind, that helps him make a better deal if they could continue the killing.
Maybe it's a part of the world. Maybe it's just his fabric, his genes, his genetics, but he thinks that makes him give some strength in negotiating. I think it hurts him. Susan, it's such a fascinating answer to that question.
And it also underscores that even if there is a ceasefire agreement, just how delicate and fragile it would be. I think it's a credit to Matt for knowing other forms of war, who are saying the back of the 8th. How much research is that? I would say that for a little bit.
That was impressive. I'm hoping you just didn't know that. I would just know what the president said there in that response. It was not a condemnation of the continuing assault on civilians in Ukraine.
It was, oh, yeah, he's trying to negotiate, and maybe it's in his genes. And I think this is what makes some Western leaders so nervous, despite his recent rhetoric that he won't trade away territory, I don't think they think they can count on what President Trump is going to do. There is that air of unpredictability. And Matt Gorman, President Trump would argue that's what makes him a good dealmaker.
You don't know what he's going to do. You don't know what he's going to say. He likes to keep the people he's negotiating with off guard. His critics would argue it's a chaotic way of trying to handle something that is so enormous.
What do you make of it? And do you think that he has learned from his first summit with President Putin in 2018? I think he has. I remember very vividly the Helsinki summit.
That was not good for either him or the party writ large. I do think what's unique about this scenario, and unlike the Europeans, there is zero true political pressure on Trump from any extraneous forces in his own party to get a deal done. This is about him legitimately and I think rightly wanting peace. He obviously wants to know about peace price for his own reasons, but it frees him up a little bit where there's not political pressure on us to go to a deal that doesn't work for either party.
I think that's unique in that respect. I think you're right. Cornell, this is such a fascinating event to watch unfold and to try to discuss through a political lens because Democrats want there to be an end to the fighting and agreeing. Everyone actually wants the president to be successful in this.
I think, well, once in a time, you know, partisanship stopped at our borders. I mean, that's been blown up. Look, one, I hope, I hope by the way, being that he's former KGB. I hope that we do a sweep of the car for bugs.
But look, I think when you do see Democrats and Republicans wanting peace because people are dying, like you're reporting on this, like over a million casualties thus far. So I think people do get nervous with how loosey-goosey he is with this and not being fully prepared. I mean, this isn't the man who did not know that the president of Liberia spoke English, right? So hopefully he hasn't back done his research.
And I spoke with a senior administration official this morning, Susan, who said he is realistic heading into this meeting. And I thought it was an interesting word to use. And the question is, how realistic is he being about who President Putin is, a former KGB officer, and what he's capable of? He has met with President Putin before presumably he has learned lessons from those past meetings.
But with great admiration. I mean, one of the perplexing things about his first term was his admiration for Vladimir Putin and his kind of trust in him, even more than his own intelligence services. So surely this is a, Trump in his second term is very different from Trump in his first term. He's much more confident.
He is much more sure what he wants to do. And I can tell you, you can tell he definitely wants to deal with this war because one, number one, he said he'd do it. He said he'd do it 200 days ago. And number two, because we are watching an extraordinary campaign for the Nobel Peace Prize.
Well, pick up on that point, Cornell, because former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton said she would nominate President Trump if he could get a deal in which, in which no territory was swapped. Obviously, anyone you talk to says there's going to be, as President Trump said, in his own words, some quote, unquote, swapping of territory. However, it was a notable moment. Well, I'm sorry, but it's kind of gross.
But you're talking about theater and you're talking about someone putting themselves again front and center in a narcissistic way, when again, thousands, 100,000 people being heard. This man has taken children from Ukraine to Russia, right? This is not theater. This is serious and high stakes.
Yeah. Even Secretary of State Marco Rubio once referred to him as a war criminal with 10 seconds left. Yeah. Yeah.
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Yeah. Yeah. Excuse me. The news continues right now.
Hey, it's Kate Snow, NBC News anchor and host of the drink this month. Demi Lovato is my guest, the Global Superstar tells me that she is the happiest she's ever been right now, but getting there, it wasn't simple. Demi opens up about starting in Hollywood young and why she now thinks she may have started