Trump to Make 'Major Statement' on Russia Monday

Watch Trump to Make 'Major Statement' on Russia Monday - Bloomberg on Dailymotion

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00:00Greg, good morning. So what can we actually expect President Trump to say, and how could this shape

00:04U.S. foreign policy moving forward? Well, this could be a number of things. In recent weeks,

00:11we really have heard a shift in tone from President Trump on Russia. He's seemingly grown

00:17increasingly frustrated with Russia over their intransigence in talks and the continued bombardment

00:22of Ukrainian cities with drones and missiles. So what we could hear from Trump would be

00:28more of that continued rhetoric or even something like the introduction of sanctions on Russia.

00:34It could also be potentially an announcement about weapons deliveries to Ukraine as Ukraine

00:39seeks to protect itself from these bombardments. But on the other hand, we also had Secretary of

00:43State Marco Rubio, who just met with his Russian counterpart, Sergei Lavrov. They discussed Ukraine,

00:49among other things, in that discussion, and so it could be something out of that.

00:52The key thing to watch will be, is there some kind of concrete announcement, something on sanctions,

00:57weapons deliveries, or the talks at hand? Or is this just really more rhetoric? And that will be the key

01:02to deciding whether this is an actual shift in U.S. policy or whether this is continued frustration

01:06with Putin, but not really a real policy change.

01:11Greg, President Trump also threatened the possibility of more sanctions against Russia.

01:15So how likely is this?

01:18Well, up until now, we've seen a real reluctance from President Trump to impose sanctions on Moscow.

01:23I mean, he has said on a number of occasions that that is an option at hand and that he would consider

01:28it. But so far, there's been no introduction of sanctions. And we've heard that he's actually

01:32quite reluctant to do so. Some in his party, including in the Senate, are really anxious to

01:39try to impose new sanctions. There is a Senate legislation for imposing sanctions. It's quite

01:45punitive. But if he does decide to impose sanctions, it could come about quickly. He probably would have

01:50the backing of Congress. But as of right now, it seems that it's still rhetoric. We don't know if

01:56he's actually decided that, yes, now is the moment. That's something we could learn on Monday as well.

02:01Greg, meanwhile, the Ukrainian president attended a conference in Rome and seemed pretty optimistic.

02:07What are the main key takeaways?

02:10Yeah, there definitely were some positive sounds from President Volodymyr Zelensky coming out of that

02:15conference. Zelensky has been on the hunt for Patriot missile batteries. Those help protect against the

02:20drone and missile barrages that Russia has been launching against Ukraine. He seems pretty confident

02:25that those would be coming. And allies seem to back that up, saying that Patriots would be delivered

02:31to Ukraine and that they were on board with supplying Ukraine with that. Trump said that they would be

02:38supplied, but that NATO allies would pay for them. So it does seem some movement there in terms of the

02:43deliveries. Of course, this is coming against the backdrop of these incredibly large and growing

02:48missile and drone barrages that Russia has been launching against it. So Ukraine really looking

02:53for ways to try to shield against those increasingly lethal attacks.