Macron arrives at the White House to engage in Ukraine discussions with Trump.
He is the first European leader to visit Trump since his return to power a month ago.
Published : 24 Feb 2025, 08:38 PM
French President Emmanuel Macron arrived at the White House on Monday for talks with U.S. President Donald Trump, with discussions expected to focus on efforts to end the war in Ukraine—despite sharp differences over the path forward.
Macron is the first European leader to visit Trump since his return to power a month ago. The two leaders were set to join a G7 call, hold bilateral talks, and later address a joint press conference scheduled for 2 p.m. EST.
British Prime Minister Keir Starmer is expected to visit Trump later this week, as European leaders grow increasingly concerned about Trump’s hardened stance on Ukraine and his overtures to Moscow. Both Macron and Starmer aim to dissuade Trump from rushing into a ceasefire deal with Russian President Vladimir Putin, insisting on Europe’s involvement and pressing for military guarantees for Ukraine.
Meanwhile, Trump and his administration have been negotiating a revenue-sharing deal with Ukraine to recover some of the funds the previous Biden administration provided in military aid. Over the weekend, Trump expressed confidence that an agreement would be reached soon.
Last Wednesday, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky rejected U.S. demands for $500 billion in mineral wealth as repayment for wartime assistance, arguing that Washington had not provided anywhere near that sum and had yet to offer concrete security guarantees.
Macron hopes to leverage his past relationship with Trump, forged during their first terms in office. He has warned that accepting a bad deal would be tantamount to Ukraine’s capitulation and a show of weakness to U.S. adversaries, including China and Iran.
"I will tell him: deep down, you cannot be weak in the face of President Putin. That’s not who you are, it’s not in your nature, and it’s not in your interest," Macron said in a social media Q&A ahead of his visit to the White House.
