The White House on Tuesday reiterated a warning that it was on the brink of exiting mediating efforts to end Russia’s war in Ukraine, unless there were “concrete proposals from both parties,” as Secretary of State Marco Rubio put it.
State Department spokesperson Tammy Bruce voiced Rubio’s statement during her daily press briefing. “We are now at a time where concrete proposals need to be delivered by the two parties on how to end this conflict,” she said.
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“How we proceed from here is a decision that belongs now to the [US] President [Donald Trump]. If there is no progress, we will step back as mediators in this process,” Bruce added.
Rubio made similar statements lately, most recently on Sunday following a call with his Russian counterpart, Sergey Lavrov.
Yet it wasn’t immediately clear whether his Tuesday warning was also a reflection of the administration withdrawing its proposals from the peace talks, which had been recently circulated in the media and were pushed back on by Ukraine and its European allies as they laid out their “red lines” on Crimea’s future. The Trump team plan also reportedly ruled out Ukraine’s NATO membership.
When pressed by Kyiv Post’s Washington correspondent, Bruce answered in the daily briefing that she couldn’t speculate on the matter other than confirming that the White House was seeking a “complete, durable ceasefire and an end to the conflict,” not a “three-day moment so you can celebrate something else.”
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Rubio’s latest warning came as the Trump administration marked its first 100 days in office. The State Department, in a fact sheet, highlighted the Trump team’s self-assessed success in holding parallel US-Ukraine and US-Russia negotiations to broker “an energy ceasefire and an agreement to ensure safe navigation, eliminate the use of force, and prevent the use of commercial vessels for military purposes in the Black Sea.”
White House-led talks in Saudi Arabia last month and in Europe this month led to no breakthrough over the administration’s initial proposal of a 30-day ceasefire. Kyiv backed the idea, but the Kremlin rejected it, and continued its bombing of Ukraine, which prompted Trump to question over the weekend whether Putin wanted to “stop the war” after all.
“It makes me think that maybe he doesn’t want to stop the war, he’s just tapping me along, and has to be dealt with differently, through ‘Banking’ or ‘Secondary Sanctions?’ Too many people are dying!!!” Trump wrote Saturday on Truth Social.
Shelby Magid, Deputy Director at the Atlantic Council’s Eurasia Center, believes that Trump’s frustration “is justified.”
Speaking to Kyiv Post, Magid said that Russia is seeking to normalize relations with the United States “without any concessions or respect for human life, dignity, and President Trump himself.”
“Secretary Rubio is right to emphasize the importance of progress, but it is important to clarify that President Trump’s position should not mean walking away from America’s support for Ukraine,” she said. “Rather, it signals a willingness to step back from unproductive negotiations, especially when Moscow shows no intention of ending their war. That kind of pressure could be more concerning to the Kremlin than to Kyiv,” Magid said.
The expert also emphasized that applying pressure to Russia by pausing talks while continuing to provide Ukraine aid, intelligence sharing, and the means to protect themselves “could be a smart strategic move paired with increasing sanctions and secondary tariffs.”
“Such moves would recognize Moscow for what they are, a bad-faith actor [sic] with no appetite for peace,” she concluded.
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