President Donald Trump and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy will meet at the White House on Friday after a war of words about peace negotiations and an abrupt reversal of US politics towards Vladimir Putin and Russia.
As the war approached its three -year brand, Trump had called Zelenskyy a “dictator without elections” and a “modestly successful comedian” while he was a deferential to Putin, saying that the United States would negotiate the terms of an agreement with Russia.
That occurred after Zelenskyy said Trump lived in a “disinformation network” after an initial round of conversations on Tuesday among the best officials in the United States and the Kremlin in Saudi Arabia and Trump falsely suggesting that Ukraine had begun the war, instead of Russia invaded.
The immediate business in question, which could help determine the future of peace conversations, is the signing of an agreement that would give the United States access to the mineral resources of its Ukraine, an agreement that Trump has launched a way to ensure that US taxpayers receive returned for supporting Ukraine in their war with Russia.
“We will be digging. We will be digging, dig, dig. We have fun, we must,” Trump said Thursday, saying that the United States would be “making a substantial amount of work” in Ukraine “taking the rare earths, which we need in our country very bad.”
“It will be great for Ukraine,” he continued. “It’s like a great economic development project. Therefore, it will be good for both countries.”
The president of the United States, Donald Trump, speaks during a press conference with British Prime Minister Keir Starmer (not in the photo) at the White House in Washington, DC, on February 27, 2025.
Brian Snyder/Reuters
Zelenskyy, meanwhile, has talked about the deal in different terms, describing it as a means to an end: keep us back.
While the agreement would not provide full military security guarantees guarantee that Zelenskyy says they are vital for a peace agreement, Trump administration officials have said that an economic investment in the United States. Uu. In Ukraine it could serve as a kind of barrier for a greater Russian invasion.
The president of Ukraine, Volodymyr Zelenskyy, speaks during a press conference in kyiv, Ukraine, on February 26, 2025.
Tetiana Dzhafava/AFP through Getty Images
“I will meet with President Trump,” said the Ukrainian leader on Wednesday. “For me, and for all of us in the world, it is crucial that the help of the United States does not stop. Force is essential on the road to peace.”
ABC News spoke with officials and analysts to break what is in the agreement, and what the agreement could mean for the future and efforts of Ukraine to end the war after three years exhausting.
The Republican presidential candidate and former president of the United States, Donald Trump, and the president of Ukraine, Volodymyr Zelenskyy, meet at the Trump tower in New York City, on September 27, 2024.
Shannon Stapleton/Reuters, file
What is and is not, in the deal?
Officials familiar with negotiations say that, according to the terms of the agreement, the United States and Ukraine will work together to dig up deposits of valuable minerals and other natural Ukrainian resources.
Unlike the original proposal, this framework does not require Kyiv to use the income of the sale of these resources to pay the US $ 500 billion, which the Trump administration previously characterized as “recovery” for the invasion of approximately $ 183 billion in response to the invasion of Russia, according to the United States inspector general in charge of the entertainment on Ukraine aid.
On the other hand, the agreement aims to create an investment fund for the reconstruction of the postwar period of Ukraine that will be joint property of both countries, they say, and that the additional negotiations on the control of that fund and its operation will take place after the initial agreement is consolidated.
Other factors will depend on the free market.
“The profitability of the fund depends completely on the success of the new investments in Ukraine resources,” said Gracelin Baskaran, director of the critical mineral security program at the Center for Strategic and International Studies and Meredith Schwartz, associate of research in the same program.
“Therefore, the response of the private industry is key to the success of the fund and will determine how much value the United States finally derives,” they added.
But the authorities say that the Ukrainians also made concessions. The authorities say that kyiv initially wanted the terms of the agreement to include concrete security guarantees for Ukraine, something that lacks the current framework.
“However, the idea is that with the American joint investment-Ukraine in the resources of the Nation, the United States will continue to have a participation in the security, stability and lasting peace and, therefore, will be encouraged to defend and defend Ukrainian security,” said Baskaran and Schwartz.
If it is successful, Baskaran and Schwartz say that the United States can boost their mineral safety, but that the results could take decades to reach a good end.
“Mining is a long -term effort, so the United States may not obtain benefits for another 20 years,” they said.
Trump himself has recognized uncertainty.
“You know, cavas and maybe things are not there as if you think they are there,” he said Thursday.
President Donald Trump (R) celebrates a bilateral meeting with British Prime Minister Keir Starmer at the Oval Office of the White House in Washington, DC, on February 27, 2025.
Jim Watson/AFP through Getty Images
A different melody of Trump
After repeatedly hitting Zelenskyy in recent days, Trump softened his tone on Thursday.
When asked if he still believed that Zelenskyy was a dictator, an affirmation he made just over a week ago, Trump replied: “I said that? I can’t believe I said that,” before moving on to the next interrogator.
Later in the day, Trump also praised Zelenskyy and the value of Ukrainian combatants on the battlefield.
“We have given him a lot of team and a lot of money, but they have fought very bravely. It doesn’t matter how you believe it, they really fought,” he said. “Someone has to use that team. And they have been very brave in that sense.”
It is likely that Ukrainian officials who have been urging Zelenskyy to accept the mineral pact see this change as a positive evidence for their main argument: to sign in the Trump agreement will increase the ties between the Trump and kyiv administration, while the vision of the president of Zelenskyy will extract.
But if any Bonhomie will last it is not clear.
“The critical access of mineral resources is the last scenario for Trump to focus its transactional methods of diplomacy,” Baskaran and Schwartz argue. “But the viability of the agreement remains to be seen as tensions continue to increase between the two world leaders.”
Trump is not known for his patience, and some US officials anticipate that the slow results of the agreement could leave Trump frustrated.
Or, if the two face during their High Risk Meeting of the White House, the president could be bitter to Zelenskyy again, even before, where Trump is likely to propose potential benefits that the mineral agreement has for the United States and the Ukrainian leader is likely to drive the additional US security guarantees.
But the president only shared positive predictions on the eve of the meeting.
“I think we are going to have a very good meeting,” he said. “We will get along very well. We are fine. We have a lot of respect. I have a lot of respect for him.”
John E. Herbst, senior director of the Eurasia Center of the Atlantic Council and former ambassador of the United States in Ukraine, argues that the very fact that the meeting between Zelenskyy and Trump is taking place is a good sign for Ukraine.
“Zelenskyy’s visit stands out how far it has come from two weeks ago, when Trump talked about seeing Putin up to three times in the near future, or even last week, when the senior Russian and American officials met in Riyadh,” he said. “However, now it is Zelenskyy, no Putin, in the oval office.”
The other negotiations
While much of the public approach has changed to negotiations during the Mineral Agreement in recent weeks, the conversations finally destined to finish the war in Ukraine have continued silently on a separate track.
On Thursday, American and Russian officials met in Istanbul for more than six hours to discuss the increase in personnel in their respective embassies in Moscow and Washington: a Secretary of State for Marco Rubio movement previously said to promote cooperation of potential areas between countries, including the resolution of the war in Ukraine.
Officials on the sides reported a favorable result of the meeting, and predict that a larger diplomatic footprint could create impulse for peace conversations and a potential summit between Trump and the Russian leader Vladimir Putin.
As a choir of European leaders, it has tried to encourage Trump to include US security guarantees for Ukraine to enforce Russia with Russia, the president has continued to say that he trusts Putin to maintain his part of an agreement.
“I have known him for a long time,” Trump said. “I don’t think I will violate your word. I don’t think I return. When we make a deal, I think the treatment will take place.
But before his meeting with the United Kingdom Prime Minister Keir Starmer, he added a potentially important warning.
“You know, look, it’s, trust and verify, let’s call it that,” he said.
Clifford D. May, founder and president of the Foundation for the Defense of Democracies, argues that it is imperative for the president to have clear eyes in his treatment with Putin.
“As President Trump tries to negotiate Russia’s war against Ukraine, it is not unreasonable for him to show respect for Mr. Putin (as he has been) if he believes that will make Mr. Putin more likely to accept concessions,” he said.
“But it is imperative that President Trump do not house illusions about Putin, about his character, ambitions, ideology and his permanent hatred for American greatness,” May added.
