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By Matthew Tostevin
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U.S. President Donald Trump may walk away from Ukraine, his son Donald Trump Jr. said on Sunday as the latest attempt to broker an end to the war since Russia’s invasion in 2022 showed little sign of progress.
Trump Jr. was scathing about corruption in Ukraine under President Volodymyr Zelensky and said the war there was not a big issue for Americans – ranking far below U.S. drug deaths at a time the president is waging war on alleged narcotic traffickers in Latin America.
Newsweek submitted a request for comment to the Ukrainian presidency outside business hours.
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Why It Matters
The comments from Trump’s oldest son are a sign of the growing frustration in his administration with attempts to broker peace in Ukraine, where Russia has continued to stage heavy attacks despite the peace efforts and Ukraine and its European allies have been critical of the apparent U.S. readiness to make territorial concessions to Russian President Vladimir Putin as the price of a deal.
What To Know
Trump Jr. was asked at the Doha Forum in Qatar whether it was his hunch that President Trump was going to walk away from Ukraine.
“I think he may,” Trump Jr. responded.
“What's good about my father, and what's unique about my father is you don't know what he's going to do: the fact that he's not predictable. He's not following the playbook of every clown who's, again, been a bureaucrat for decades.”
Trump Jr. criticized European countries complaining about his father’s attempts to secure a peace deal they say would reward Russian aggression when they are not willing or able to do more themselves.
“If we default to the old ways of America, it's just going to be the big idiot with the checkbook. That's not going to work, that's not going to happen,” Trump Jr. said.
Strains between Trump and the Europeans have deepened since the release of a new National Security Strategy late last week that described Europe in terms of decline and questioned how long its countries could remain allies. It made clear they would have to strengthen their own defense capabilities.
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Speaking at the same forum as Trump Jr., former U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton was critical of Trump’s relationship with allies and his policy in Ukraine, describing it as: “Supporting Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, both in an affirmative way by very rarely criticizing Putin for the brutal war that he has waged on the Ukrainian people and then attempting to try to coerce the Ukrainians into accepting a negotiated ceasefire and peace deal.”
Trump Jr. said he did not believe Ukraine was a big issue for Americans after speaking to audiences of hundreds of thousands of Republicans. Polls consistently show inflation and the economy as top issues.
Trump Jr. was also critical of corruption in Ukraine, saying that while on holiday in Monaco he had seen supercars with Ukrainian plates. Ukrainian leaders have recently been hit by a number of corruption scandals, which have led to the departure of Zelensky’s own deputy.
“The leaders, the decision makers, there was no reason for them to ever come to peace. No different than Putin,” he said.
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What People Are Saying
Donald Trump Jr.: “It was a far more corrupt country than Russia as delegated by the United States government prior to this war, but then because of the war, and because he's one of the great marketers of all time, Zelensky became a borderline deity, especially to the left, where he could do no wrong.”
Hillary Clinton: “Putin is intent upon taking as much of Ukraine as he can. I think we could have played, both in the Biden administration and now in the Trump administration, a much more assertive role in trying to help Ukraine continue to do the very job it’s doing defending itself.”
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said in an X post on Saturday: " Ukraine is determined to keep working in good faith with the American side to genuinely achieve peace. We agreed on the next steps and formats for talks with the United States. I thank President Trump @POTUS for such an intensive approach to negotiations.”
What Happens Next
Even if Ukraine and its European allies agree terms for peace that they believe would be acceptable, those are unlikely to meet with Moscow’s approval while it still sees itself as having a military advantage. Fighting looks set to continue, with Russia pressing on with slow and costly, advances as it tries to seize all of the Donbas region that it claims.
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