Trump: Ukraine Minerals Deal May Be Signed Next Week

In yet another presser (President Trump sure talks to the media a lot, unlike some other recent presidents we might name) with Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni, POTUS took a few questions on the Russo-Ukraine War, and his thoughts on bringing it to an end.

He reiterated the war wouldn't have started had he been in office at the time:

.@POTUS: "I don't hold Zelenskyy responsible, but I'm not exactly thrilled with the fact that war started. That's a war that would have never started if I was President. You'd have millions of people living right now that are dead." pic.twitter.com/7l6DMumxaM
— Rapid Response 47 (@RapidResponse47) April 17, 2025

The president said, in part:

I don't hold Zelensky responsible, but I'm not exactly thrilled with the fact that war started. That's a war that would have never started if I was president. You'd have millions of people living right now that are dead. You'd have cities that would be open and thriving, that would have those beautiful turrets, those turrets are the most beautiful in the world. But they're not with us any longer. They're smashed to smithereens.

Of course, Ukraine's President Zelensky didn't start the war; Russia invaded Ukraine, after previously seizing Crimea. And speaking of Russia, President Trump also indicated that a final ceasefire agreement might be in the works.

REPORTER: How much longer does Putin have to respond to your ceasefire proposal?@POTUS: "We'll see... We're going to be hearing from them this week... but we want it to stop. We want the death and the killing to stop." pic.twitter.com/Xbz5EusLZh
— Rapid Response 47 (@RapidResponse47) April 17, 2025

Question: How much longer does Vladimir Putin have to respond to your ceasefire proposal before you put secondary tariffs on Russia?
President Trump: We'll see what that will be. We're going to be hearing from them this week. Very shortly actually. And, we'll see. We want this to stop. We want the death and the killing to stop.

And, also on Thursday, another piece of information surfaced that may put a slightly different light on not only Russia's reply, but on our dealings with China, as well.

BREAKING: Ukraine Agrees to 30-Day Ceasefire; Now the Ball Is in Putin's Court

In short, the long-awaited U.S./Ukraine minerals deal could be signed soon.

President Donald Trump on Thursday said an 80-page minerals deal will be signed with Ukraine in one week.
While Trump announced during a press event from the Oval Office alongside Italy’s Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni that the deal would be signed next Thursday, Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent later amended that it would likely be signed on April 26.
Details on the agreement still remain relatively unknown, though recent reporting by Bloomberg has suggested the U.S. has eased back its demands of repayment for its aid in Ukraine’s fight against Russia from $300 billion to $100 billion.

Now, this is where things get interesting.

Granted, were any minerals deal signed today, it would still be a matter of months, if not years, to implement. But when it's in place, that may well place American business interests in Ukraine in one form or another, whether it be actually doing the mining or just working with Ukraine to develop the extraction. The presence of those interests would, we should hope, make Russia a little more cautious; blowing up a few American mining engineers would not be wonderful for U.S.-Russian relations.

We might also note that China is, currently, the source of many of these same mineral resources, but in the short term, any agreement with Ukraine won't alter the status of American trade with China; any appreciable mineral resources from Ukraine, as I noted, are months if not years away from being realized; some kind of trade deal with China can't wait that long.

This is a puzzle with many pieces, and we're all going to have to wait and see how the United States, Russia, Ukraine, China, and other involved nations put them all together.

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