U.S. President Donald Trump appeared to confuse Alaska with Russia on Monday as he spoke about plans to meet the country’s President Vladimir Putin.
Trump was announcing his plans to deploy the National Guard to Washington, D.C., and federalize the city when he told reporters he was meeting Putin in Russia.
The president is, in fact, meeting his Russian counterpart on Friday in Alaska, which has not been a Russian territory since 1867, when the U.S. bought it for $7.2 million.
Highlights
- Trump mistakenly said he was meeting Putin in Russia, but the meeting will be held in Alaska, which was sold to the U.S. by Russia in 1867.
- The high-stakes meeting follows Trump's announcement of secondary sanctions on countries buying Russian oil without a Ukraine ceasefire.
- Trump suggested the talks will focus on land swaps between Russia and Ukraine, a proposal firmly rejected by Ukrainian President Zelenskyy.
- Putin’s planned U.S. visit marks his first meeting with a U.S. president since 2021.
Donald Trump mistakenly said he was meeting Vladimir Putin in Russia
Image credits: The White House
“This is a tragic emergency, and it’s embarrassing for me to be up here,” Trump told reporters.
“You know, I’m going to see Putin. I’m going to Russia on Friday. I don’t like being up here, talking about how unsafe and how dirty and disgusting this once-beautiful capital was.”
The pair are meeting after Trump announced he would place secondary sanctions on countries purchasing Russian oil if the Kremlin did not agree to a ceasefire in Ukraine.
Trump had set a deadline for the ceasefire deal last Friday, August 8, but instead of announcing tariffs against Russia, he announced they would be meeting in person.
It is the first time Putin will have met a U.S. president since 2021, when he met Joe Biden in Switzerland.
Friday will mark the Russian leader’s first visit to the U.S. in a decade.
Trump has held several phone calls with Putin to discuss the war in Ukraine since he took office for a second time in January, but none have yielded results.
When he was campaigning for office, Trump continuously said he would end the war within 24 hours and that it never would have started if he were president.
But he has admitted that the task at hand has been more difficult than anticipated.
Image credits: Hasan Akbas/Anadolu via Getty Images
Putin is subject to an International Criminal Court (ICC) arrest warrant for suspected war crimes relating to the deportation of children from occupied areas of Ukraine to Russia.
The U.S. is not a part of the ICC, so it is not bound by obligation to arrest Putin.
Trump has suggested that the meeting with Putin will largely focus on land swaps, something that was immediately rejected by Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy.
Last week, Trump was asked about that land swap, and he said it was “very complicated” but that they were looking to get some Ukrainian territory back.
Trump said discussions would focus on land swapping
Image credits: Contributor/Getty Images
“But we’re going to get some back, and we’re going to get some switched,” he said. “There will be some swapping of territories to the betterment of both.”
Over the weekend, Zelenskyy, who has not been invited to the meeting, rejected the idea of ceding land to Russia and said Ukraine would not reward Russia for its invasion.
“The answer to the Ukrainian territorial question already is in the Constitution of Ukraine. No one will deviate from this – and no one will be able to,” he wrote on Telegram.
“Ukrainians will not gift their land to the occupier. Ukraine is ready for real decisions that can bring peace. Any decisions that are against us, any decisions that are without Ukraine, are at the same time decisions against peace.”
Image credits: Mikhail Svetlov/Getty Images
Trump appeared frustrated with Zelenskyy’s stance on the matter.
“I was a little bothered by the fact that Zelenskyy was saying, ‘Well, I have to get constitutional approval,’” Trump said.
“He’s got approval to go into war and kill everybody, but he needs approval to do a land swap, because there’ll be some land-swapping going on.
“I know that through Russia, and through conversations with everybody. To the good, for the good of Ukraine—good stuff, not bad stuff, also some bad stuff for both.”
Image credits: Sean Gallup / Getty Images
According to people familiar with the talks, the deal would see Russia keeping control of the Crimean Peninsula and the Donbas region of eastern Ukraine, which is made up of Donetsk and Luhansk, the BBC reported.
Russia currently has some military control in Kherson and Zaporizhzhia, which it would need to give back to Ukraine under the deal.
The exact location of the meeting in Alaska has not been released, but lawmakers hope the meeting will be a step towards peace.
“President Trump announced he will meet with President Putin in Alaska next Friday to continue negotiations to end Russia’s catastrophic war in Ukraine,” Alaska Senator Lisa Murkowski said on X last week.
The U.S. bought Alaska from Russia in 1867
Image credits: Gretarsson
“This is another opportunity for the Arctic to serve as a venue that brings together world leaders to forge meaningful agreements.
While I remain deeply wary of Putin and his regime, I hope these discussions lead to genuine progress and help end the war on equitable terms,” she added.
While Trump has expressed frustration with Zelenskyy since he returned to office, he has also become increasingly frustrated with Putin.
He suggested that he might leave both countries to fight it out, saying that “probably in the first two minutes I’ll know exactly whether or not a deal can get done.”
“I may leave and say good luck, and that’ll be the end,” he added.