Rubio denies European leaders coming to White House to 'keep Zelensky from being bullied'
U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio on Aug. 17 dismissed the idea that European leaders are accompanying President Volodymyr Zelensky on his visit to the White House in order to keep the Ukrainian leader "from being bullied."
Zelensky will meet with U.S. President Donald Trump in Washington, D.C. on Aug. 18 to discuss the next steps in negotiating an end to Russia's full-scale war against Ukraine. Seven European leaders, including French President Emmanuel Macron and U.K. Prime Minister Keir Starmer, will join him at the White House.
In an interview with CBS, Rubio was asked if the entourage of European power players was meant to protect Zelensky from being bullied by Trump into signing an unfavorable peace deal. Rubio rejected the suggestion as "not true" and "a stupid media narrative."
"They're not coming here tomorrow to keep Zelensky from being bullied," he said.
"They're coming here tomorrow because we've been working with the Europeans — we talked to them last week; there were meetings in the U.K. over the previous weekend."
The White House meeting on Aug. 18 comes three days after Trump met with Russian President Vladimir Putin for bilateral talks in Alaska. Ukraine and Europe were excluded from participating in the Alaska Summit, which ended without a peace deal.
Following his conversation with Putin, Trump also dropped his demand for Russia to implement a ceasefire, breaking from the European and Ukrainian position. Trump had earlier committed to securing a ceasefire from Putin during the summit.
Trump now favors a rapid peace deal to end the war, and is reportedly supportive of a Russian proposal that would see Ukraine surrender the entirety of Donetsk and Luhansk oblasts, including currently unoccupied lands, in exchange for peace.
Shortly after the Alaska Summit, Trump invited Zelensky to discuss the peace proposal at the White House. Zelensky's last Oval Office meeting infamously ended with Trump and U.S. Vice President JD Vance berating the Ukrainian president and accusing him of ingratitude. Zelensky was ejected from the White House and the U.S. temporarily froze military aid to Ukraine.
"Oh, this is such a stupid media narrative that they're coming here tomorrow because Trump is going to bully Zelensky into a bad deal," Rubio told CBS.
"We've been working with these people for weeks — for weeks — on this stuff. They're coming here tomorrow because they chose to come here tomorrow. We invited them to come. We invited them to come. The President invited them to come."
Rubio sidestepped questions about the lack of ceasefire, saying the Alaska Summit helped move all sides closer to the possibility of a peace deal.
"If not, we wouldn't be having Zelensk flying all the way over here. We wouldn't be having all the Europeans coming all the way over here," he said.
Zelensky will be joined at the White House by Macron, Starmer, European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen, German Chancellor Friedrich Merz, Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni, Finnish President Alexander Stubb, and NATO Secretary-General Mark Rutte.
