Vice President JD Vance’s suggestion this week that the U.S. could walk away from supporting Ukraine if peace talks with Russia stagnate could serve as catnip for the Kremlin, according to experts who say Russian President Vladimir Putin might choose to smother progress in hopes of getting America to wash ‘its hands of the war.’
WhilePresident Donald Trump has indicated that the U.S. may disengage from the negotiations as a last resort if they prove futile, Vance has taken the rhetoric a step further by saying the U.S. is definitely open to doing so.
‘We’re more than open to walking away,’ Vance told reporters on board Air Force Two on Monday, just moments before a high-stakes phone call between Trump and Putin. ‘The United States is not going to spin its wheels here. We want to see outcomes.’
But Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy cautioned that no one wins if the U.S. steps aside from the talks, except for Russia.
‘It is crucial for all of us that the United States does not distance itself from the talks and the pursuit of peace because the only one who benefits from that is Putin,’ Zelenskyy wrote in a Monday post on X.
Vance’s remark about abandoning mediation between the two countries would only embolden Russia, even though a lack of U.S. involvement still wouldn’t give Putin everything he wants, according to John Hardie, the deputy director of the Foundation for Defense of Democracies’ Russia program, a nonprofit research institute based in Washington.
For the moment, Moscow still benefits from U.S. involvement in the talks because the Kremlin wants the U.S. to help advance a deal that benefits Russia and alleviates sanctions, Hardie said.
‘But, for the Kremlin, the United States washing its hands of the war would be the next best outcome if it means an end or reduction to U.S. support for Ukraine, especially since President Trump may well move to normalize relations with Russia anyhow,’ Hardie told Fox News Digital. ‘So the administration’s threat to walk away risks perversely incentivizing Kremlin intransigence. A better approach would be to ramp up the economic and military pressure on Russia if Putin continues to reject compromise.’
Russia still desires normalization with the U.S., which can only happen if the war ends swiftly and relatively amicably, said Peter Rough, a senior fellow and director of the Center on Europe and Eurasia at the Hudson Institute think tank.
‘That reset in relations is a giant carrot the administration is dangling in front of the Kremlin,’ Rough told Fox News Digital. ‘If the U.S. walks away because Russia will not make peace, however, then that carrot disappears as well.’
Rough noted that other administration officials besides Vance, including Trump and Secretary of State Marco Rubio, have mentioned the possibility of walking away from a deal, so Vance’s comments don’t necessarily reflect a huge change in policy. And it’s unclear right now what exactly stepping aside would mean.
‘The purpose of those comments has been to impress on the Kremlin that U.S. patience is not limitless,’ Rough said.
Vance hasn’t shied away from issuing bold foreign policy statements since becoming vice president. From sparring with Zelenskyy in the Oval Office in Februaryto appearing to counter Trump when Vance remarked in May that the war in Ukraine was far from over after Trump indicated a deal might emerge soon, Vance has been outspoken in a way most vice presidents haven’t been.
When asked for comment or if there were any concerns about Vance’s Monday statement, the White House referred Fox News Digital to Vance’s office. Vance’s office declined to provide comment when asked if his remarks would encourage Russia to sit the negotiations out and continue its attacks.
‘Fundamental mistrust’
Vance has adopted an outspoken approach as vice president, starting off with his fiery February statements at the Munich Security Council in which he asserted that Europe needed to ‘step up in a big way to provide for its own defense.’
That boldness has carried over into the Russia-Ukraine negotiations, where Vance has taken a proactive approach, at times appearing to be forging his own path.
Vance and Rubio engaged in discussions to end the conflict in Ukraine with Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni and European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen in Rome on Sunday, among other issues. Vance and Rubio also discussed the Trump administration’s efforts to end the war with Vatican prelate Archbishop Paul Richard Gallagher on Monday.
Aboard Air Force Two on Monday, Vance said the negotiations had reached ‘a bit of [an] impasse’ between the two countries and that the conflict is not the Trump administration’s war to wage but rather belongs to former President Joe Biden and Putin.
‘There is fundamental mistrust between Russia and the West. It’s one of the things the president thinks is, frankly, stupid, that we should be able to move beyond,’ Vance told reporters. ‘The mistakes that have been made in the past, but … that takes two to tango.’
‘I know the president’s willing to do that, but if Russia’s not willing to do that, then we’re eventually just going to have to say … this is not our war,’ Vance said. ‘It’s Joe Biden’s war, it’s Vladimir Putin’s war. It’s not our war. We’re going to try to end it, but if we can’t end it, we’re eventually going to say, ‘You know what? That was worth a try, but we’re not doing it anymore.”
Vance’s Monday statement came just before Trump was scheduled to speak with Putin, seemingly undercutting the high-leverage telephone call and also underscoring Vance’s influence over foreign policy matters in the White House.
Specifically on Ukraine negotiations, Vance has remained outspoken, engaging in confrontation when Zelenskyy visited the White House in February.
In that exchange, Vance accused Zelenskyy of being ‘disrespectful’ after Zelenskyy pointed out that Putin has a track record of breaking agreements and countered Vance’s statements that the path forward was through diplomacy to end the war in Ukraine.
‘Do you think that it’s respectful to come to the Oval Office of the United States of America and attack the administration that is trying to prevent the destruction of your country?’ Vance asked at the Oval Office meeting.
Almost immediately after the U.S. signed a minerals deal with Ukraine on May 1, Vance said the war in Ukraine wouldn’t end in the near future, despite the fact that Trump indicated the previous week that an agreement was on the horizon.
‘It’s not going anywhere,’ Vance told Fox News on May 1. ‘It’s not going to end anytime soon.’
Still, he characterized the agreement as ‘good progress’ in the negotiations.
Trump’s talk with Putin
Trump and Putin spoke over the phone Monday to advance peace negotiations to halt the conflict between Moscow and Kyiv, just days after Russia and Ukraine met in Turkey to conduct their first peace talks since 2022.
After the call, Trump said both countries would move toward a ceasefire and advance talks to end the war.
Meanwhile, Trump has suggested continued U.S. involvement may not be a viable option moving forward, but he has been reticent about specifics on what would actually prompt him to walk away from the talks. For example, Trump said on May 8 in an interview with NBC News that he believes peace is possible but that the U.S. wouldn’t act as a mediator forever.
‘Well, there will be a time when I will say, ‘OK, keep going, keep being stupid,’ Trump said in the interview.
‘Maybe it’s not possible to do,’ he said. ‘There’s tremendous hatred.’
Still, Trump signaled that the U.S. would take a backseat in the negotiations between Moscow and Kyiv after his call with Putin.
‘The conditions for that will be negotiated between the two parties, as it can only be, because they know the details of a negotiation that nobody else would be aware of,’ Trump said in a Monday post on Truth Social.
Trump has continued to distance the U.S. from the conflict, and he later described the conflict as a ‘European situation.’
‘Big egos involved, but I think something’s going to happen,’ Trump told reporters on Monday. ‘And if it doesn’t, I’ll just back away and they’ll have to keep going. This was a European situation. It should have remained a European situation.’
Trump also doubled down on extracting the U.S. from the war, claiming it didn’t involve U.S. personnel.
‘It’s not our people, it’s not our soldiers … it’s Ukraine and it’s Russia,’ Trump said in the Oval Office on Wednesday while hosting South African President Cyril Ramaphosa.
According to Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent, sanctions against Russia could ramp up in the event Russia fails to cooperate.
‘President Trump has made it very clear that if President Putin does not negotiate in good faith that the United States will not hesitate to up the Russia sanctions along with our European partners,’ Bessent said Sunday in an interview with NBC.
Vance has previously said the concessions that Russia is seeking from Ukraine to end the conflict are too stringent but believes there is a viable path to peace and wants both to find common ground.
‘The step that we would like to make right now is we would like both the Russians and the Ukrainians to actually agree on some basic guidelines for sitting down and talking to one another,’ Vance said at the Munich Leaders Meeting in Washington on May 7.
Russia’s demands include Ukraine never joining NATO and preventing foreign peacekeeper troops from deploying to Ukraine after the conflict. Russia is also seeking to adjust some of the borders that previously were Ukraine’s.