Politics

Ukraine

Promised to end in 24 hours. Twenty months later: deadlines that passed, a summit with no deal, and a call for Ukraine to find a new leader.

The argument

Ending a war is hard, and nobody else ended this one either. That is the fair starting point. The question here is how the promise and the record compare, and which side the record leaned toward.

The war he promised to end in a day is in its fifth year. Along the way he called Ukraine’s elected president a dictator, voted with Russia at the United Nations, gave Russia deadlines that passed without the promised sanctions, and in October 2026 said Ukraine should get a new leader. He also, eventually, signed the heaviest sanctions on Russia of his term. Both are on the record.

1. The promise

2. February 2025

On February 18, 2025, he said of Ukraine’s leaders, “You should have never started it. You could have made a deal.” Russia invaded Ukraine. The next evening, he posted:

On February 24, 2025, the third anniversary of the invasion, the United States voted against a United Nations General Assembly resolution backed by Ukraine and Europe, alongside Russia. It passed 93 to 18. Four days later, in the Oval Office, the vice president asked Zelensky, on camera, “Have you said ‘thank you’ once this entire meeting?” Zelensky answered, “A lot of times” (transcript).

In early March, the United States paused military aid to Ukraine for about a week, and intelligence sharing for six days, then restored both after Ukraine agreed to a 30-day ceasefire proposal. Russia agreed only to a pause on strikes against energy sites.

3. The deadlines

The day before that last remark, after a call with Putin, the administration issued a license letting Russian diesel be sold and delivered, after a call in which he said Russia would supply over 300,000 tons to the market. Zelensky called it “a weak decision by our strong partners.” On October 11 he announced an “ENERGY CEASEFIRE” that Kyiv said it had not been told about. Russia struck Kharkiv that day and again the next.

4. Utah

Senator John Curtis led a Senate delegation to Kyiv and Kharkiv in late September 2026 and has pushed for full use of the new sanctions law. Senator Mike Lee voted against the April 2024 package that included aid to Ukraine. Both voted for the 2026 sanctions law.

What is true on the other side

• He opened direct talks no one else had, in Riyadh, Jeddah, Anchorage, and the first three-way U.S.-Russia-Ukraine meetings in 2026, along with prisoner exchanges.
• Europe now pays more. Under the arrangement announced in July 2025, European countries buy U.S. weapons for Ukraine.
• The sanctions were real. The October 2025 oil sanctions and the 2026 law are the heaviest pressure on Russia of his term.
• He said Ukraine could win. In September 2025 he posted that Ukraine could “WIN all of Ukraine back in its original form.”

The common rebuttals

“24 hours was obviously an exaggeration.”

Then the real question is the direction. In twenty months the pressure fell mostly on Ukraine, the country that was invaded: a pause in aid, a peace plan drafted with Russia’s envoy, and a call for its president to be replaced.

“Zelensky is the obstacle.”

Ukraine accepted the 30-day ceasefire in March 2025. Russia did not. And Russia kept striking Kharkiv after the energy ceasefire he announced on October 11, 2026.

What this means

A war that was going to end in a day is in its fifth year, and the leader he suggested replacing was Ukraine’s.