It wasn't 'in jest.' Here are 53 times Trump said he'd end Ukraine war within 24 hours or before taking office

[Nevilledog]

https://www.cnn.com/2025/04/25/politics/fact-check-trump-ukraine-war/index.html


Washington
CNN
—
He wasn’t joking.

When President Donald Trump was reminded in an interview with Time magazine this week that he had said he would end the Russian war on Ukraine on “day one,” he claimed he hadn’t been speaking literally or seriously.

“Well, I said that figuratively, and I said that as an exaggeration, because to make a point, and you know, it gets, of course, by the fake news [unintelligible]. Obviously, people know that when I said that, it was said in jest, but it was also said that it will be ended,” Trump said, according to Time’s transcript.

This “in jest” claim is a lie.

On the campaign trail in 2023 and 2024, Trump said on dozens of occasions, in an entirely serious tone, manner and context, that he would end the war in Ukraine either within 24 hours of his return to the White House or even sooner than that. He said over and over again, including at both presidential debates of 2024, that he would have the war “settled” when he was president-elect, before his inauguration.

A Friday search of the Roll Call Factba.se database that catalogues Trump’s public remarks turned up at least 53 examples of Trump making such comments.

It’s sometimes hard to determine the intent of a politician’s one-time ad-libs, but this was no jovial ad-lib. Rather, the promise of a rapid end to the war was a sober staple of Trump’s pre-written rally remarks. He framed the promise as a key component of his second-term agenda, and he justified it with claims about his “credibility” as a leader, his history as a “peacemaker,” and his knowledge of Russian President Vladimir Putin and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky.

*snip*