Trump Pushes Fading Zelenskiy Toward Risky Ukraine Election

Volodymyr Zelenskiy knows a thing or two about wearing different guises. As a comedian, humor was his armor. As a wartime leader it was military fatigues. But there was no disguising the sense of betrayal reverberating in Ukraine as the president put on a brave face to let the world know about his latest dispiriting call with Donald Trump.

The US president had earlier spoken for 90 minutes with Vladimir Putin and for all intents and purposes sold Ukraine out, extinguishing any hope for NATO membership or American boots on ground. Russia would probably keep most of the territory it had snatched over the years. All Zelenskiy could do or say about Trump was to “appreciate his genuine interest.”

It didn’t take long for Ukrainians to air their suspicion on social media that a deal had been done behind their backs. Gone was even the pretense that Ukraine had a seat at the table (Asked whether Ukraine would be an equal partner in talks, Trump said “it is an interesting question.”). In its place was open musing that Ukraine “may be Russian someday.” 

Zelenskiy’s own immediate future is now in doubt. 

He’s had an uneasy relationship from the get-go with Trump, starting with a fateful 2019 phone call. The US leader, then in his first term, urged Zelenskiy to investigate claims against rival Joe Biden in return for military aid. Trump never warmed to him. 

Now he’s making it obvious he wants Zelenskiy out. A person close to Zelenskiy said US officials were pressing in private that it was time to hold elections. Those intimations are no longer subtle as Trump makes digs at the president’s popularity.

“He’s going to have to do what he has to do,” Trump said of Zelenskiy needing to cede territories. “But, you know, his poll numbers aren’t particularly great, to put it mildly.”

The heat is such that Zelenskiy had to come out Thursday to say Trump didn’t raise the issue of holding elections during their phone call.

Three years after Russia’s invasion, Zelenskiy’s approval ratings have slumped after peaking at 90% in the first month of the war. Public fatigue has set in and while he’s trying to avoid lowering the conscription age to include younger men, there’s growing pressure on him to take the deeply unpopular step.

Elections were suspended when Ukraine declared martial law on the day Russia launched its full-scale attack. Zelenskiy’s term would have expired in May last year otherwise, and he’d pledged previously that he’d serve only one term.

Zelenskiy strongly opposes elections now for fear it may undermine Ukraine’s fragile stability, according to a person close to him. 

European allies are equally concerned that a change of leadership at this stage — especially if the US is seen as pushing for it — plays straight into Putin’s hands. The Russian leader has taken to questioning Zelenskiy’s legitimacy, even as his own elections have always been tightly stage-managed by the Kremlin.

Domestic political tensions are piling up. Ukraine’s Security and Defense Council — headed by Zelenskiy — sanctioned opposition leader and former President Petro Poroshenko on Thursday. It blocked his assets in the country and limited his business operations. 

Poroshenko called the decision a “colossal blow” to Ukraine’s internal unity. These are the first cracks against Zelenskiy at home at a time of maximum peril.

Criminal cases were opened against Poroshenko before the war, triggering criticism from Ukraine’s allies, and the latest move may add to difficulties for Kyiv on its path to European Union membership.

Zelenskiy, who surprised even himself when he won the presidency by a landslide, has visibly aged under the pressures of wartime leadership. 

He’s sometimes shown flashes of anger that have prompted some European allies to suggest he should show more gratitude for the support they’ve provided and be less impatient with his demands.

In an interview with the New Yorker, before an ill-advised trip to swing state Pennsylvania during last year’s US election campaign, he accused Trump’s running mate JD Vance of being “too radical.” Now he has to face Vice President Vance, who said in 2022 “I don’t really care what happens to Ukraine one way or another.”

There’s growing disappointment with Trump among officials in Zelenskiy’s office because they don’t understand how to deal with him, a person familiar with the matter said on condition of anonymity.

The Ukrainian leader tried a pragmatic business-like approach in talks with Trump, suggesting access to the country’s critical minerals in exchange for protection.

 Trump immediately said he wanted the equivalent of $500 billion worth of these assets and dispatched Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent to nail down an “economic cooperation agreement.”

The question for Zelenskiy, 47, is whether he’ll be sacrificed at the altar of a deal forced down his throat — and then agrees to makes way for someone else more palatable to Trump, so that his country gets better treatment.

In that scenario, the only candidate who really stands out is Zelenskiy’s one-time top general, Valeriy Zaluzhnyi, who commanded Ukrainian land forces as they first mounted a defense against Russian forces then seized back territory early in the war. 

The two men later fell out over military strategy after a much-vaunted 2023 counter-offensive ended in failure, with the tide then turning in Russia’s favor.

Zaluzhnyi arguably became more popular than Zelenskiy and a potential rival. After being replaced as army chief, he was packed off to London as Ukraine’s ambassador, where he has kept a low profile.

While he hasn’t declared an ambition to be president and doing so would likely be unwise in his position, Zaluzhnyi has published the first in a trilogy of memoirs — edited by his wife with an audience of young people in mind — that will keep him in the public eye.

The 51-year-old has also given occasional public speeches, including one recently to an audience of students at Ukraine’s Catholic University in Lviv, close to the border with Poland. He argued for abstract virtues like leadership and strength in the face of major challenges — while steering clear of overt criticism of the course of the war. 

It’s been a year since he was exiled, and he marked the day with a short and telling post on Facebook: “I haven’t changed and I’m not broken.”

Rare opinion polls that mention Zaluzhnyi still seem to give him the highest support rating of all personalities in Ukraine, and an edge over Zelenskiy. Ukrainians themselves don’t appear eager to go to the ballot box. 

Zelenskiy no doubt is weighing his options. 

His recent announcements on price cuts for medicine and delaying the draft of more men into the army indicate he could run for re-election. But Trump’s move may have changed the calculus.

To make matters worse, the Trump administrations’ dismantling of USAID has hit Ukraine hard. Millions of dollars in aid that were used to bolster cybersecurity, support independent media and safeguard fair elections disappeared overnight. 

By contrast, Russia has engaged in increasingly aggressive misinformation campaigns and election-meddling in former Soviet Union countries that it wants to bring back into its orbit. An election in Ukraine now would be just the kind of outcome Putin wants.

Meanwhile, Russia’s army is steadily advancing on Ukrainian territory. Ukraine suffers from a lack of weapons and manpower and even gallows humor of the sort that Zelenskiy was once a master of can’t cut through as it used to. 

Back in 2022, US television personality David Letterman traveled to Kyiv in those early months when Zelenskiy’s status as war hero was at its height. A comedian by profession, Zelenskiy told a joke.

Two Jewish guys from Odesa meet. “So what’s the situation? What are people saying?” People are saying that Russia is at war with NATO. “So how is it going?” 

Zelenskiy takes his time. “Well, 70,000 Russian soldiers are dead. The missile stockpile has almost been depleted. A lot of equipment is damaged, blown up.” And what about NATO? 

“What about NATO? NATO hasn’t even arrived yet,” Zelenskiy said with dead-pan delivery. 

The audience laughed, but he didn’t.