Trump Administration ‘Committed to a Peace Deal’ in Ukraine, Says Leavitt

Following groundbreaking developments regarding the Russia-Ukraine war, a Wednesday briefing from White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt offered more details about President Donald Trump’s phone call with Russian President Vladimir Putin and reaffirmed the Trump administration is “wholeheartedly committed to a peace deal.”

Leavitt began the briefing with the latest updates from the Trump administration’s diplomatic efforts with Russia and Ukraine. First, Leavitt addressed Trump’s recent announcement of “productive” separate phone calls Wednesday with Putin and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy. 

“I, myself, just spoke to the president about these calls, and he told me to tell all of you, they were very good calls,” Leavitt said. “They were very positive, and the administration is wholeheartedly committed to a peace deal to end once and for all the Russia-Ukraine war.”

Leavitt also discussed the release of Marc Fogel, a schoolteacher held in Russia since 2021. Fogel was brought to the White House on Tuesday evening to meet with the president on his return to the United States. 

“Thanks to the great leadership of President Trump, the strong and tough leadership of President Trump, Marc Fogel, an American teacher detained by Russia, was returned to American soil and met with the president here at the White House last night,” the press secretary said.

“Special Envoy Steve Witkoff and the rest of President Trump’s incredible national security team helped to negotiate the exchange that secured Marc Fogel’s release,” Leavitt added. “This event shows a good-faith effort from Russia, and it’s a sign, as I just said, that we are moving in the right direction to end this brutal war.”

In response to Trump’s latest diplomatic efforts, Sen. Mike Lee, R-Utah, told The Daily Signal, “The Trump administration’s return to a sane, America First foreign policy reverses Joe Biden’s sleepwalk toward open war with nuclear-armed Russia and will finally bring about a negotiated peace to end the killing in Ukraine.”

Just over an hour prior to Wednesday’s briefing, Trump posted on Truth Social about a “lengthy and highly productive phone call with President Vladimir Putin of Russia.”

Trump claimed the two leaders “discussed Ukraine, the Middle East, energy, artificial intelligence, the power of the dollar, and various other subjects.”

The most pressing issue for the two leaders is putting an end to the Ukraine war, which is set to enter its fourth year in two weeks’ time. Putin invoked Trump’s “very strong campaign motto of ‘COMMON SENSE,’” according to Trump’s post, when discussing the need to end hostilities in Ukraine. 

“We agreed to work together, very closely, including visiting each other’s nations,” Trump added, planting the seed of a potential Trump-Putin summit to come. With negotiations in early stages, however, Leavitt did not have more information on later meetings or summits between the two men.

Trump went on in the Truth Social post to say that the U.S. and Russian negotiators will ramp up their work to end the war “immediately” while looping in Zelenskyy.

“I have asked Secretary of State Marco Rubio, Director of the CIA John Ratcliffe, National Security Advisor Michael Waltz, and Ambassador and Special Envoy Steve Witkoff, to lead the negotiations, which, I feel strongly, will be successful,” the president added.

Leavitt later clarified in the briefing that, though unmentioned in the Truth Social post, General Keith Kellogg, Trump’s special envoy for Ukraine and Russia, has been and will remain “a critical part of his team and its effort.”

“He’s played a tremendous role in getting the negotiations to this point and he’s very much still part of the Trump administration,” Leavitt added.

Like Trump, Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth wants to see an end to the war. In Brussels, Hegseth recently suggested that a return to Ukraine’s pre-2014 borders and extending Ukraine NATO membership were unrealistic negotiating demands. Leavitt demurred on questions about a nuclearized or NATO Ukraine, hinting that the president could be discussing this more shortly and that “Secretary Rubio and also Vice President JD Vance will be meeting directly with President Zelenskyy in Munich on Friday.”

“President Trump and his administration are proceeding prudently to end the war in Ukraine by being realistic about what is achievable and avoiding security commitments that don’t make sense for the U.S.,” Will Ruger, president of the American Institute for Economic Research and a former Trump nominee to serve as the United States Ambassador to Afghanistan, told The Daily Signal. “Closing the door to Ukraine joining NATO as part of a settlement is good for the U.S.”

Leavitt said she was unaware of whether or not Fogel’s release was part of the opening of negotiations to settle the war in Ukraine. Fogel was serving a 14-year prison sentence for allegedly bringing 17 grams marijuana into the country illegally for chronic pain. Late last year, the U.S. government designated Fogel as a “wrongfully detained” individual. 

“What I can say is that this was a very good deal for the United States of America and for the rest of the world,” Leavitt said. In return for Fogel, the U.S. was prepared to return Alexander Vinnik, a nonviolent crypto criminal, to Russia.

Leavitt told reporters Vinnik and the Russians agreed to forfeit “more than $100 million that he obtained in that illegal crime.”

As for Fogel, the press secretary said he “kissed the American soil when he returned to the United States of America. It was a great deal and a great day for our country.”

Leavitt also said that she was unaware of any preconditions set by Trump or his national security team before negotiating an end to the Ukraine war. “I was just talking with the president and our national security team. I wasn’t made aware of any conditions,” though she added, “That doesn’t mean they don’t exist.”

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