Trump issues warning as US awaits response to ceasefire proposal

As the United States waits for Russia to respond to a proposed ceasefire with Ukraine that was brokered by American officials, President Donald Trump is offering words of warning for Russian leaders.

“In a financial sense, yeah we could do things very bad for Russia, would be devastating for Russia,” Trump said Wednesday when asked about sanctions and pressuring Russia to accept the ceasefire during a White House meeting with Ireland’s leader.

Trump added that he doesn’t want to inflict harm on Russia, saying he wants to see peace after three years of fighting between the neighbors.

The two-term U.S. president has been highly critical of Volodymyr Zelenskyy, chastising the Ukrainian leader on social media and in a dramatic Oval Office clash. His latest comments are some of the strongest Trump has made toward Russia.

Ukrainian leaders committed to the 30-day ceasefire, which would freeze the conflict along current battle lines, on Tuesday after holding talks with U.S. officials in Saudi Arabia.

The United States resumed intelligence sharing and military assistance to Ukraine after Zelenskyy agreed to the ceasefire deal, the first step in trying to end the latest deadly conflict that started in February 2022. The assistance was paused after the Oval Office clash.

Secretary of State Marco Rubio said Wednesday that the United States will “have contact with them today,” referring to Russian leaders.

“As far as the Russian reaction to it, that’s really the question here,” Rubio said, adding: “We’re going to bring it to them directly. … If their response is yes, then we know we’ve made real progress and there’s a real chance at peace. If their response is no, it would be highly unfortunate and it would make their intentions clear.”

White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt said national security adviser Michael Waltz had a call with his Russian counterpart Wednesday. Special Envoy Steve Witkoff will travel to Moscow this week, she said.

“We urge the Russians to sign on to this plan,” Leavitt said. “This is the closest we have been to peace in this war. We are at the 10th yard line and the president expects the Russians to help us run this into the end zone.”

Ahead of the talks in Saudi Arabia, Rubio said negotiators would not be “sitting in a room drawing lines on a map.” However, Trump said Wednesday that the distribution of land had been discussed.

“We’ve also discussed land and other things that, you know, go with it. We’re not just doing it and saying ceasefire,” Trump said. “We know the areas of land we’re talking about, whether it’s pull back or not pull back. You know, we’ve discussed a lot of the details of what has to go because we don’t want to be wasting time.”

Trump in February said he would seek to get back as much of the land that Russia forcibly took from Ukraine as possible. The pledge came after his defense secretary, Pete Hegseth, warned that Kyiv needed to accept that “returning to Ukraine’s pre-2014 borders is an unrealistic objective.”

This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: Trump warns Russia as U.S. awaits Ukraine war ceasefire response