United States President Donald Trump has made a sequence of claims about Ukraine and its chief as he seeks to end the nation’s three-year struggle with Russia.
Trump’s relationship with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy soured publicly as Trump known as Zelenskyy a “dictator” and mentioned he “began” the struggle with Russia, a declare PolitiFact rated pants-on-fire false. The disagreement has escalated after Zelenskyy accused Trump of repeating Russian misinformation.
Trump, who despatched a staff to Saudi Arabia on Tuesday to start negotiations on ending the struggle that didn’t embody Ukraine, described Zelenskyy as a “modestly profitable comic” who was solely good at taking part in former US President Joe Biden “like a fiddle”.
The White Home didn’t reply to a request for remark. Right here, we fact-checked six of Trump’s claims about Zelenskyy and Ukraine:
Declare: Zelenskyy began the struggle with Russia
Russian President Vladimir Putin has lengthy sought responsible Ukraine for the struggle he began when he launched an invasion on February 24, 2022. Trump echoed that speaking level to reporters on Tuesday after Zelenskyy mentioned Ukraine had not been invited to US-Russian talks in Saudi Arabia to finish the struggle.
“Right now I heard [from Ukraine], ‘Oh properly, we weren’t invited.’ Effectively, you’ve been there for 3 years. You must have ended it three years – it’s best to have by no means began it. You could possibly have made a deal,” Trump mentioned.
The killing of an estimated 46,000 Ukrainian troopers and a minimum of 12,000 Ukrainian civilians within the battle is properly documented.
Information protection, video footage and the United Nations documented Russia’s invasion of Ukraine in actual time. Putin introduced it as a “particular navy operation” at 6am in Moscow (03:00 GMT) on February 24, 2022.
“The aim of this operation is to guard individuals who for eight years now have been going through humiliation and genocide perpetrated by the Kiev regime,” Putin mentioned in a televised deal with. A transcript of his speech used the Russian spelling of Ukraine’s capital. “To this finish, we are going to search to demilitarise and denazify Ukraine in addition to carry to trial those that perpetrated quite a few bloody crimes towards civilians, together with towards residents of the Russian Federation.”
Putin’s false rationalisations for the struggle had been named PolitiFact’s Lie of the Yr in 2022.
Declare: Zelenskyy is a dictator
A professor who researches democracy and dictatorships mentioned it is a mischaracterisation.
Zelenskyy was democratically elected in March 2019 to a five-year time period with greater than 73 p.c of the vote. He would have been up for re-election in March or April final yr. Nevertheless, Ukraine imposed martial legislation after Russia’s invasion. Ukrainian legislation prohibits elections beneath martial legislation.
Trump known as Zelenskyy “A Dictator with out Elections” in a Reality Social put up on Wednesday. At his Mar-a-Lago property in Florida the day earlier than, reporters requested Trump whether or not he supported Russia’s demand for Ukraine to carry new elections to succeed in a peace deal.
Trump mentioned: “Yeah, I’d say that, you already know, when they need a seat on the desk, you would say, the individuals should – wouldn’t the individuals of Ukraine should say, like, you already know, ‘It’s been a very long time since we’ve had an election?’”
Thousands and thousands of Ukrainian residents have been displaced by the struggle or have fled the nation and plenty of others reside in Russian-occupied territory, so holding elections might disenfranchise many citizens.
“To name Zelensky a dictator is like calling Winston Churchill a dictator as a result of the UK postponed elections till after the tip of World Battle Two,” Fathali Moghaddam, a Georgetown College psychology professor who researches democracy and dictatorships, mentioned in an e-mail to PolitiFact. “Clearly, the time period dictator doesn’t apply to Zelenskyy, simply because it doesn’t apply to Churchill.”
A spokesperson for United Kingdom Prime Minister Keir Starmer advised the BBC it was “completely affordable to droop elections throughout wartime because the UK did throughout World Battle II” and Zelenskyy is Ukraine’s “democratically elected chief”.
Putin received re-election to a different six-year time period in March in an election the US Nationwide Safety Council mentioned was “clearly not free nor truthful”.
“Trump can be appropriate to make use of the time period dictator to explain Putin, who has used pretend elections to stay in energy for 1 / 4 of a century,” Moghaddam mentioned.
Declare: Zelenskyy has a 4 p.c approval ranking
That is inaccurate. Trump made these feedback at a information convention on Tuesday, and it wasn’t clear what ballot he was citing. A search of Google and the Nexis information database discovered no stories of polls exhibiting Zelenskyy with a 4 p.c approval ranking.
In a Kyiv Worldwide Institute of Sociology ballot carried out February 4-9, Zelenskyy had a belief ranking of 57 p.c amongst 1,000 Ukrainians surveyed. That’s down from 90 p.c in Might 2022 shortly after Russia’s invasion however up from 52 p.c in December 2024.
Some social media customers, together with X proprietor Elon Musk, sought to discredit the polling by linking the Kyiv Worldwide Institute of Sociology to the US Company for Worldwide Improvement, which has been on the centre of distorted claims. The social media posts provided no proof for his or her declare that the polling will not be credible.
The Ukrainian information website Ukrainska Pravda reported the nation’s main polling businesses haven’t revealed polls exhibiting approval rankings through the struggle. One which has revealed approval rankings, the Sotsys Group, reveals Zelenskyy with 16 p.c approval. That ballot, Ukrainska Pravda mentioned, is tied to the previous chief political strategist of Ukraine’s fifth president, Petro Poroshenko, who Zelenskyy beat in 2019.
Declare: The US has spent $350bn to assist Ukraine
That is inaccurate. Trump’s determine almost doubles the quantity that Congress has appropriated or made out there because the struggle started.
Ukraine Oversight – the web site of the particular inspector basic for Operation Atlantic Resolve, which the US authorities created in 2014 to coordinate its navy support to Ukraine – mentioned that as of September 30, the US had spent $183bn to assist Ukraine.
Mark Cancian, a senior defence and safety adviser on the Heart for Strategic and Worldwide Research, mentioned the quantity the US has spent varies relying on what’s being counted as “support to Ukraine” however most estimates are within the vary of $175bn to $185bn.
“It doesn’t matter what you add, nonetheless, the entire doesn’t get near $350bn,” Cancian mentioned.
The numbers cited by Trump when it comes to support to Ukraine contradict information from the US authorities itself. Unbiased analysis institutes additionally mentioned the help despatched to Ukraine by the US was decrease than $350bn. In accordance with the Kiel Institute for the World Economic system, the US despatched about $120bn as of December.
Declare: Zelenskyy mentioned he doesn’t know the place half of the cash the US has given Ukraine went
In a February 2 interview with The Related Press, Zelenskyy mentioned Ukraine’s navy has acquired solely a portion of the billions in US support earmarked for Ukraine’s defence towards Russia.
Zelenskyy cited a complete of $177bn or $200bn spent by the US and mentioned Ukraine had not acquired about $100bn of that whole. The official quantity spent by the US on Ukraine is $183bn.
Zelenskyy wasn’t saying that the remainder of the cash was lacking. Direct navy assist to Ukraine totalled about $70bn. Of $175bn appropriated by Congress, a lot of it was spent within the US on weapons producers and US navy and authorities operations.
Declare: Zelenskyy was ‘sleeping and unavailable’ to satisfy Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent final week in Kyiv
Photographs present that is inaccurate. Trump advised reporters on Wednesday on board Air Drive One which Bessent was handled “relatively rudely” when he visited Kyiv on February 12 as a result of Ukraine rejected a Trump administration proposal to provide the US a share of Ukraine’s uncommon earth minerals. Trump additionally mentioned Zelenskyy was “sleeping and unavailable” to satisfy Bessent.
Trump’s assertion is contradicted by information images and movies of Bessent and Zelenskyy assembly in Kyiv. Photographs and a recap of the assembly are additionally on the Ukrainian president’s web site.
On Thursday, US Nationwide Safety Adviser Michael Waltz demanded that Zelenskyy return to negotiations over the minerals deal with the US. Zelenskyy has publicly rejected the US uncommon earths demand. The Ukrainian chief has been demanding safety ensures as a part of any peace deal.
