WASHINGTON — President Donald Trump on Monday declared that his administration was making a “decisive break with foreign policy views” of his predecessor while hosting the leader of one of the oldest U.S. allies, France’s Emmanuel Macron, for his first meeting with a European leader at the White House since returning to power. 

At the forefront of the sit-down between Trump and Macron is the war in Ukraine. Their meeting aligned to the day with the three-year anniversary of Russia’s invasion. 

Trump, who has been calling for a swift end to the fighting, asserted at a joint press conference that his administration has made more progress toward a ceasefire in the first few weeks of his presidency than the entirety of the last three years, noting he has spoken with both Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy and Russian leader Vladimir Putin, the latter of which marked a sharp turn in the U.S. approach to the war. He told reporters earlier in the Oval Office that an end to the fighting could come “within weeks.” 

Trump called Macron’s visit an “important step forward” in reaching such a goal, adding that the French leader has been involved since the beginning. The U.S. president insisted that Putin would accept European peacekeeper troops in Ukraine as part of a potential agreement to stop the fighting. 

“He has no problem with it,” Trump told reporters. 

Trump, however, would not elaborate on any possible security guarantees from the U.S., saying "Europe is going to make sure that nothing happens.”

The U.S. is pushing for Zelenskyy to agree to a deal that would give it access to Ukraine's rare earth minerals, something Trump insisted was necessary on Monday given the “colossal amounts of money” America has spent to aid Ukraine in the war effort. Trump said American taxpayers “deserve to recoup” funds. 

He expressed optimism that Zelenskyy – whose relationship with Trump has grown particularly frosty in recent weeks – would come to the White House soon to sign such a deal on critical minerals after the Ukrainian leader said "we are making great progress" on the agreement in a post on X over the weekend. 

The relationship between the two men hit lows over the last week, particularly when Zelenskyy asserted the U.S. leader was living in a “disinformation space” in response to him saying Ukraine started the war and when Trump referred to his Ukrainian counterpart as a “dictator.” 

Trump deferred on Monday when asked if he would call Putin the same thing. 

The U.S. president last week also dispatched top officials in his administration to meet with Russian counterparts in Saudi Arabia on ending the war, sparking concern from Ukrainian and European leaders about being left out of talks and leading European leaders to huddle in Paris in response.

The U.S. president also reiterated to reporters that he plans to meet with Putin himself and would consider visiting Moscow at an “appropriate time.” 

The French and U.S. leaders started the day participating together in a virtual meeting with fellow leaders of the Group of Seven economies to discuss the fighting. The pair then sat down in the Oval Office before joining both sides’ wider teams for lunch and then holding a joint press conference. 

The meeting between the two leaders comes under the shadow of uncertainty about transatlantic relations as Trump pushes his “America first” approach to foreign policy. The president has criticized NATO allies for not spending enough on defense and European allies — specifically France and the U.K. recently — for not doing enough to help Ukraine. 

“I’m also pleased that President Macron agrees that the cost and burden of securing the peace must be borne by the nations of Europe, not alone by the United States,” Trump said. 

U.K. Prime Minister Keir Starmer is set to visit the White House later this week.