Trump says he will meet with Putin in Budapest to discuss war in Ukraine
By Samantha Waldenberg, CNN
(CNN) — US President Donald Trump said on social media Thursday that he would meet with Russian President Vladimir Putin in Budapest, Hungary, to discuss the war in Ukraine, though he did not specify when that meeting may take place.
Trump announced the plans on Truth Social following a lengthy phone call with Putin, which he said “was a very productive one.”
“President Putin and I will then meet in an agreed upon location, Budapest, Hungary, to see if we can bring this ‘inglorious’ War, between Russia and Ukraine, to an end. President Zelenskyy and I will be meeting tomorrow, in the Oval Office, where we will discuss my conversation with President Putin, and much more,” the president added.
Trump also noted that Secretary of State Marco Rubio will lead a delegation of high-level advisors to meet with Russian officials next week, with a location “to be determined.”
“At the conclusion of the call, we agreed that there will be a meeting of our High Level Advisors, next week. The United States’ initial meetings will be led by Secretary of State Marco Rubio, together with various other people, to be designated. A meeting location is to be determined,” the president wrote.
Putin immediately supported Trump’s idea of a planned summit in Budapest to discuss ending the Ukraine war, Kremlin aide Yury Ushakov said, describing the call between the two leaders as “highly informative and extremely frank.”
The call lasted nearly two-and-a-half hours and was held at the request of Russia, Ushakov said.
The plans come more than two months after Trump held his last in-person summit with Putin in Anchorage, Alaska.
Budapest was a finalist for to host that meeting before officials ultimately landed on Alaska, according to multiple sources familiar with the matter. Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban has maintained a close relationship with Putin and Trump.
Orban welcomed Thursday’s news, saying “we are ready” to host the visit.
“The planned meeting between the American and Russian presidents is great news for the peace-loving people of the world,” Orban posted on X.
‘A very good and productive call’
Trump said in his post on social media that he believes “great progress was made with today’s telephone conversation” and noted a number of topics of discussion.
“President Putin congratulated me and the United States on the Great Accomplishment of Peace in the Middle East, something that, he said, has been dreamed of for centuries. I actually believe that the Success in the Middle East will help in our negotiation in attaining an end to the War with Russia/Ukraine,” the president wrote in his social media post. “We also spent a great deal of time talking about Trade between Russia and the United States when the War with Ukraine is over.”
Putin also thanked first lady Melania Trump during the call for her advocacy for children, Trump said. “He was very appreciative, and said that this will continue,” he added.
The first lady announced last week that Russia had allowed eight Ukrainian children to reunite with their parents, following months of private discussions between Russian officials and the first lady’s office centered on children separated from their families during the war.
Pressed for more information after the conclusion of the call, White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt said that the administration would provide “more details as soon as we can.”
“This call literally just happened, so we will provide you with more details as soon as we can,” she told reporters.
Leavitt added that the call between the two leaders lasted “more than two hours.”
“I was just talking with the president and the secretary of state and the vice president, and it was a very good and productive call. It lasted more than two hours,” she told reporters.
The president has recently floated the possibility of giving Ukraine Tomahawk cruise missiles unless Russia dramatically changes its negotiating posture. The topic of Tomahawks was not included in the president’s readout of his phone call with Russia’s leader.
CNN has previously reported that Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky told a group of journalists in Kyiv that the main topics of his conversation with the president on Friday at the White House will include “air defense and our possibilities with long-range (missiles to put) pressure on Russia.”
This story has been updated with additional details.
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CNN’s Anna Chernova, Billy Stockwell, Kristen Holmes, Zachary Cohen, Jim Sciutto, and Betsy Klein contributed to this report.
