Moving to another favored talking point, Trump repeatedly described how he had demanded that NATO’s European allies contribute more to the alliance when he was U.S. president, implying that he would do the same when it comes to Ukraine’s fight against Russia’s invasion.
“The European nations — they should be equalizing, they should be paying up. I did this with NATO. I made them all pay … I said if you don’t pay I’m not going to be there. And the money came pouring in.”
Zelenskyy, for his part, was finishing up a day of meetings in Washington, D.C., including with President Joe Biden, Vice President Harris and a bipartisan group of Congress members, as he seeks to shore up military and financial support for Ukraine ahead of the November election.
Biden announced more than $8 billion in military assistance for Kyiv ahead of Thursday’s meeting, and Harris said as she stood beside Zelenskyy that “Ukraine’s fight matters to the people of America.”
But Kyiv is concerned that U.S. commitments to Ukraine are waning as the war drags on, particularly among Republicans. Even if Harris wins the election, Congress still plays a crucial role in green-lighting money for Ukraine.
Trump used his press conference Thursday to restate his boast that Russian President Vladimir Putin would not have started the full-scale invasion of Ukraine if he had been still in the White House, and claim he would be able to secure peace.