On Trip to U.S., Zelensky Finds Ukraine’s Fortunes Tied to the Election

A whirlwind week of top-level meetings failed to alleviate concerns in Kyiv that a Trump presidency could lead to a dramatic shift in American policy.

When President Volodymyr Zelensky of Ukraine set off for the United States this week on a high-stakes diplomatic mission, he had one goal above all others: rekindle a sense of urgency among his allies about Kyiv’s fortunes as the war with Russia heads into what promises to be another brutal winter.

But after wrapping up a whirlwind week capped by a meeting with former President Donald J. Trump on Friday in New York, he was set to return to Kyiv with “more questions than answers about the near future” for the Ukrainian war effort, said Mikhail Minakov, head of the Ukraine research program at the Kennan Institute in Washington.

The only thing that seemed clear was that Ukraine’s prospects for repelling Russian aggression were now firmly swept up in the maelstrom of the American presidential campaign.

Despite having worked studiously to avoid becoming embroiled in partisan politics — mentioning the importance of solidarity across party lines in nearly every public statement — Mr. Zelensky found himself caught in the hostile glare of Mr. Trump and his supporters.

Republicans called for an investigation into his trip to a Pennsylvania munitions factory, the Speaker of the House of Representatives, Mike Johnson, said Kyiv should fire its U.S. ambassador for arranging the visit, and Mr. Trump delivered a series of speeches deriding Mr. Zelensky, misstating facts about the war, echoing Kremlin talking points and saying Ukraine was already basically lost.

“Ukraine is gone,” Mr. Trump, the Republican presidential nominee, said at a North Carolina campaign event this week. “It’s not Ukraine anymore.”

“Any deal, even the worst deal, would have been better than what we have right now,” he said.

After their meeting on Friday, which lasted about an hour, the two appeared on Fox News together. Mr. Trump said only that he is looking for “a fair deal for everybody,” in terms of ending the war. “I’m sure President Putin wants it to stop,” he said.

Mr. Zelensky said “we need to do everything to pressure” Russia to stop the war and bring about “a just peace.”

While the meeting was an effort to maintain bipartisan relations, it did little to alleviate concerns in Ukraine that a Trump presidency could lead to a dramatic change in American policy.

Serhiy Sydorenko, editor at European Truth, an independent online news outlet, had provided a sobering assessment in a Facebook post before the meeting, writing that Mr. Trump’s recent comments reflected the fracturing of bipartisan support for Ukraine.

“This is the bottom of the bottom,” he wrote. “And this is an artificially, groundlessly created crisis. Yes, it will have profound negative consequences”

But others were more upbeat. “I just hope that this meeting will lower the temperature and lead to calmer and better relations,” said Yaroslav Zhelezniak, an opposition lawmaker, after Mr. Zelensky and Mr. Trump emerged from their meeting.

Mr. Trump’s earlier hostility stood in contrast to the pledges of support that Mr. Zelensky received from President Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris. Ms. Harris, the Democratic nominee for the White House, reaffirmed her support for Ukraine after a meeting with Mr. Zelensky on Thursday.

In a dig at Mr. Trump, she said that those who would “force Ukraine to give up large parts of its sovereign territory” are doing the Kremlin’s bidding by pushing a policy of “surrender.”

The concern about Trump overshadowed Ukraine’s frustration with the Biden administration, which Kyiv believes has been too cautious in providing support.

Mr. Zelensky has for weeks been calling for the U.S. and its western allies to allow Ukraine to use their weapons to strike deeper into Russia, saying that was the best way to reverse Russia’s battlefield momentum and to give Kyiv leverage in any future peace negotiations.

He said that he hoped Ukraine’s offensive into the Russian Kursk region, as well as its more powerful strikes inside Russia using its own, domestically produced weapons, would demonstrate to the White House that Mr. Putin’s “red lines” were scare tactics.

But the Ukrainian leader failed to get a commitment from the Biden administration that it will lift restrictions on the use of Western weapons to hit inside Russia, with the White House weighing concerns in the American intelligence community that Russian retaliation for such a move would outweigh the benefits, given the limited supplies of weapons at Kyiv’s disposal.

Mr. Zelensky also failed to make significant gains with members of the U.S. Congress, many of whom had left Washington for their home districts in advance of the Nov. 5 elections. And he was competing for attention with the escalating violence in the Mideast that has dominated diplomatic circles recently.

But Mr. Zelensky did get promises of military assistance that should help Ukraine fight through the winter, whatever happens in the November election.

President Biden’s commitment of $8 billion worth of weapons — including glide bombs, air defense missiles and an additional Patriot battery — is a desperately needed boost as Ukrainian soldiers fight grueling battles to contain Russian advances, and air defense teams struggle every night to shield its already shattered energy grid from further bombardment.

Still, Mr. Minakov, from the Kennan Institute, said that the trip likely left the military disappointed and Mr. Zelensky’s domestic political opponents emboldened, by seeing his standing on the world stage weakened.

Members of Mr. Zelensky’s party were instructed not to speak to the media, Ukrainian lawmakers said, a reflection of the delicate diplomatic moment and the his office’s desire to keep tight control over information.

It was not just Mr. Trump who cast a shadow over Mr. Zelensky’s visit.

President Vladimir V. Putin sought to influence the diplomatic negotiations from the Kremlin by announcing an updated nuclear doctrine that authorized the use of nuclear weapons against nonnuclear states that attack Russia when they are supported by nuclear powers. The Kremlin later acknowledged Mr. Putin’s statements were referring to the war with Ukraine, which he has long claimed was the West’s way of fighting a proxy war against Russia.

Ukrainians were largely dismissive of the threats.

Andriy Yermak, Mr. Zelensky’s chief of staff, said the announcement demonstrated that Russia “no longer has anything other than nuclear blackmail to intimidate the world.”

As Ukraine’s fate is discussed and debated among international leaders, Ukrainian soldiers are engaged in some of the most intense battles of the war, with Russian soldiers launching fierce assaults across the front.

The soldiers are keenly aware of how political decisions in Washington reverberate to the battlefield, with many still bitter over the months of delays before a $61 billion military assistance package was finally approved in April.

Oleksandr, a senior commander for the 68th Jaeger Brigade, said that what was true on the front line was equally true in the halls of power.

“When Russians get a strong pushback, they don’t continue fighting actively — this applies both to politics and direct combat,” the commander said, asking that only his first name be used in accordance with military protocol

But he worried that the West still can’t shake the idea that “Russia is powerful and unbeatable.”

“In my firm opinion, the West is very afraid that Putin might use nuclear weapons, that he might do something drastic,” he said during an interview in Pokrovsk in eastern Ukraine.

The Russians have advanced to within a few miles of the city, which is steadily being destroyed.

“If you look at us Ukrainians, what worse could happen to us now than what Putin has already done in the last two and a half years?”

Whatever politicians in Washington and European capitals decide, he said, he will not stop fighting as long as Russians remain on Ukrainian land.

“Even if we don’t get any supplies, I can confidently say that for myself and my subordinates, 99 percent of us will keep fighting,” he said. “As guerrillas, not guerrillas — either way, we will find ways to keep going.”

Maria Varenikova and Constant Méheut contributed reporting from Kyiv.