Trump and Putin set for Alaska showdown as sidelined Zelensky waits to discover Ukraine’s fate: Live updates

Here are some more pictures of the moment Donald Trump boarded Air Force One as he flies to Alaska to meet Vladimir Putin.

Trump waved before entering the aircraft at Joint Base Andrews in Maryland as he prepares to meet the Russian leader in Anchorage.

The flight to Alaska’s largest city is expected to take between seven and eight hours.

Jon Michael Raasch, U.S. Political Reporter:

President Donald Trump has boarded Air Force One.

The 79-year-old Republican took the long walk up the red stairs before turning to give a wave before heading into the aircraft.

He arrived at the presidential plane a few minutes before 8:00 am ET.

Before entering AF1, Trump told reporters that his number one goal is to ‘save lives.’

Jon Michael Raasch, U.S. Political Reporter:

President Donald Trump and his team are en route to Joint Base Andrews.

The president’s longtime aide, Dan Scavino, posted a video of the presidential limousine, nicknamed the Beast, rolling through Washington, D.C., towards the airport.

‘Another historic day begins—President Trump departs Washington, D.C. for Alaska,’ Scavino wrote.

Another video from Trump aide Margo Martin shows the motorcade zipping down a D.C. freeway with helicopters watching the procession from overhead.

Russia has flipped Donald Trump ‘a middle finger the size of the Statue of Liberty’ after Vladimir Putin’s right hand man arrived for peace talks in a t-shirt glorifying the Soviet Union.

Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov arrived in Alaska with the letters CCCP clearly scrawled across his front – the Russian acronym for the USSR.

He was seen walking out of his car in the Russian designer top before brazenly conducting interviews with the media in it, ahead of crunch talks between Putin and Donald Trump to discuss ending the war in Ukraine.

Ukrainian diplomats, soldiers and citizens reacted with fury to the highly provocative move that came just hours after Mr Trump bragged that Putin ‘is not going to mess around with me’.

Oleg T, 33, a special forces soldier who is fighting in eastern Ukraine, told the Mail: ‘That’s not a message – it is trolling the Americans. It is a middle finger the size of the Statue of Liberty. If Trump doesn’t see that, then he has chosen to be blind.

Jon Michael Raasch, U.S. Political Reporter:

A cast of top White House staffers is also expected to travel with President Trump to Alaska in addition to some Cabinet members.

• Susie Wiles
• Dan Scavino
• Steven Cheung
• Karoline Leavitt
• Ambassador Steve Witkoff
• Ambassador Monica Crowley

Several other White House staffers will also be traveling to Alaska.

Jon Michael Raasch, U.S. Political Reporter:

President Trump is expected to arrive at Joint Base Andrews momentarily.

Video feeds show that Air Force One is prepared and ready to fly.

The president left the White House via motorcade around 7:30 am ET.

Nikki Schwab, Chief Campaign Correspondent:

President Donald Trump said Thursday that there’s a ’25 percent’ chance his meeting with Russian President Vladimir Putin is a failure.

Trump gave those odds during a phone interview Thursday morning with Brian Kilmeade, as part of his Fox News radio show.

The president leaves first thing Friday for his meeting with Putin, which is taking place in Anchorage, Alaska.

Trump played coy when asked by Kilmeade what he might offer Putin to entice him to stop his three and a half year assault on neighboring Ukraine.

‘Well, I’d rather not say,’ the president answered. ‘Because I don’t want to play my hand in public.’

Jon Michael Raasch, U.S. Political Reporter:

President Donald Trump is bringing some of his top Cabinet members to Alaska for his meeting with Russian President Vladimir Putin.

Fox News confirmed the following will be traveling with the president on Friday:

• Secretary of State Marco Rubio
• Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent
• Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick
• CIA Director John Ratcliffe

Phillip Nieto, U.S. Political Reporter:

When Donald Trump meets Vladimir Putin in Alaska on Friday, most predict a loyal lieutenant and adept foreign policy expert will be by his side.

On regulated exchange and prediction market site Kalshi, 92 percent of users predicted Secretary of State Marco Rubio would be there with Trump when he sits across from the Russian authoritarian leader at Joint Base Elmendorf-Richardson in Anchorage, Alaska, in a bold attempt to end the bloody war in Ukraine.

But coming in a close second is Trump’s special envoy to the Middle East, Steve Witkoff, who is deemed to be an 87 percent chance.

Witkoff, who has known Trump since the 1980s and plays golf with him, has earned the nickname the ‘Putin whisperer’ because he’s met with the Russian leader four times since January.

After Wikoff, Vice President JD Vance is third at 64 percent.

Jon Michael Raasch, U.S. Political Reporter:

President Donald Trump posted a brief message on Truth Social ahead of his journey to Alaska to meet with Russian President Vladimir Putin.

‘HIGH STAKES!!!’ Trump wrote on his social media app.

The Republican is expected to depart from Washington within the next hour.

Russian President Vladimir Putin has been spotted travelling to the Pacific Coast in an armoured limo ahead of his highly anticipated summit with Donald Trump in Alaska, with a massive convoy sweeping through sealed-off roads.

Footage shows a long line of black vehicles speeding along a road, flanked by flashing police cars and trailed by what appears to be an ambulance.

The tight security comes as Putin prepares to sit down with Trump on Friday for their first face-to-face meeting since 2018.

Jon Michael Raasch, U.S. Political Reporter:

MAGA firebrand Marjorie Taylor Greene ridiculed Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky for authorizing drone strikes in Russia the day before President Trump and President Putin meet.

The lawmaker posted her displeasure with Zelensky late on Thursday evening, alongside a map supposedly showing recent drone strikes.

‘On the eve of the historic peace talks between President Trump and President Putin, Zelensky does this,’ MTG posted.

‘Zelensky doesn’t want peace and obviously is trying to sabotage President Trump’s heroic efforts to end the war in Ukraine. I pray peace prevails!’

Before leaving for the US, Putin had some warm words for Trump, praising his efforts to end the war in Ukraine, more than three years after Moscow launched its invasion.

After convening with his officials ahead of today’s summit, the Kremlin released a video in which Putin said the Trump administration was making ‘quite energetic and sincere efforts to stop the hostilities’ and to ‘reach agreements that are of interest to all parties involved.’

Putin also suggested ‘long-term conditions of peace’ could be reached under an agreement with the US on nuclear arms control.

However, Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov tamped down expectations for any breakthroughs from the summit.

Peskov said there were no plans to sign documents and that it would be a ‘big mistake’ to predict the outcome of the talks, according to the Interfax news outlet.

Speaking in the Oval Office on the eve of today’s summit, Trump insisted Putin ‘is not going to mess around with me’.

The President said he would be able to know if the meeting is likely to prove productive in the first few minutes, adding it could end ‘very quickly’ if it isn’t.

Asked if he felt Putin has a ‘strong hand’, Mr Trump said: ‘Well, he came to our country.’

He said he believes the dictator ‘would like to see a deal’ adding:

If I weren’t president, in my opinion, he would much rather take over all of Ukraine but I am president and he’s not going to mess around with me.

He also blamed Russia for the war, saying: ‘Everybody’s to blame, Putin is to blame, they’re all to blame.’

Earlier yesterday, he gave himself a 75 per cent chance of success in his one-on-one. He told Fox News:

This meeting sets up like a chess game. This meeting sets up a second meeting, but there is a 25 per cent chance that this meeting will not be a successful meeting.

Trump meets Putin today for talks filled with intrigue, fraught with risk and carrying the potential for serious consequences for the future of the grinding war in Ukraine.

Foreign policy experts exclusively tell the Daily Mail that Putin’s strategy in Anchorage on Friday will be to isolate Trump from Ukraine and Europe and turn the US from a loyal supporter into a mere bystander.

Whether Trump emerges from the meeting smitten, seething or skeptical will determine whether another meeting’s in the cards or if the president has finally reached the end of his patience with Putin’s three-and-a-half year invasion.

Given the stakes, experts say it’s no surprise the White House is furiously trying to tamp down expectations for any immediate progress and characterizing Friday as ‘feel-out’ session.

‘The Kremlin’s strategy in Ukraine is to reduce the conflict into a one-on-one matchup,’ said Peter Rough of the Hudson Institute. ‘Putin will want to sidestep US sanctions and rebuild relations with Trump … If he can drive a wedge between the US and Europe, all the better.’

Read our exclusive story here:

President Donald Trump is expected to depart the White House just before 7 am ET before flying roughly eight hours from Washington, D.C., to Anchorage, Alaska.

The Republican is scheduled to travel to Joint Base Andrews before boarding Air Force One.

If Trump speaks to the press before his departure, it would likely be from the tarmac of JBA.

All the timings you need to know ahead of today’s summit in Alaska

Trump is expected to leave the White House for Anchorage which is estimated to be between a seven and eight hour flight. It is unknown when Putin will depart from Moscow for the Alaska’s largest city. Flight time will be around nine hours.

The leaders are scheduled to begin face-to-face talks at a ‘working breakfast’ in the the Elmendorf Air Force Base, the largest US military installation in Alaska and a Cold War base for surveillance of the Soviet Union. The Kremlin has said a press conference will take place following the talks

Trump is expected to leave Anchorage and return to the White House

Good morning and welcome to our live coverage on what is an historic day as Donald Trump and Vladimir Putin meet in Alaska for a high-stakes summit which may signal the outcome of the three-year war between Russia and Ukraine.

After insisting he could bring a swift resolution to the conflict upon re-entering the White House in January this year, Trump will hope to secure a peace agreement with the Russian leader.

But one notable absentee from today’s talks in Anchorage is Ukraine’s President Volodymyr Zelensky who will be waiting nervously next to a phone tonight to hear the outcome.

Stick with us throughout the day as we bring you the latest news, analysis and reaction from our reporters in London and New York.