President Donald Trump walked into a summit with Russia’s Vladimir Putin pressing for a ceasefire deal and threatening “severe consequences” and tough new sanctions if the Kremlin leader failed to agree to halt the fighting in Ukraine.

President Trump and Russia's Vladimir Putin are holding a joint news conference after a more than 2 1/2-hour meeting in Alaska.

President Donald Trump and President Vladimir Putin of Russia met Friday in Anchorage, Alaska, for the first face-to-face meeting between American and Russian leaders since Russia invaded Ukraine in early 2022.

President Trump’s break from a strategy agreed to with European allies could give President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia an edge as talks to end the fighting continue.

Trump has visited Alaska several times as president, pushed for expanded oil, gas and mining permits there, and even got funding for new polar icebreakers, a popular stance in a state he won with 54% of the vote in 2024.

Russian President Vladimir Putin got everything he could have hoped for in Alaska. President Donald Trump got very little — judging by his own pre-summit metrics.

EXCLUSIVE: First Lady Melania Trump wrote a “peace letter" to Russian President Vladimir Putin telling him “it is time" to protect children and future generations around the globe, Fox News Digital has learned.

The net effect of the Alaska summit was to give President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia a free pass to continue his war against his neighbor indefinitely without further penalty, pending talks on a broader peace deal.

FROM THE moment he stepped off his plane onto the red-carpeted tarmac, the summit in Alaska was a triumph for Vladimir Putin. He was greeted with applause from his host, Donald Trump. The two men may have had nothing to announce after hours of talks—the first meeting between a Russian and American president since the invasion of Ukraine—but the encounter at the Elmendorf-Richardson military base in Anchorage transformed Mr Putin from a pariah of the West into an honoured guest on American soil.