PALM BEACH, Florida — President Donald Trump expressed optimism about making progress on a deal to end the war in Ukraine as he welcomed President Volodymyr Zelenskyy to his Mar-a-Lago estate on Sunday. But just as he expressed his belief that Ukraine’s revised 20-point peace plan offered “the makings of a deal,” he brushed off a question about whether he would sign a commitment to providing Ukraine specific postwar security guarantees, signaling that there are still several hurdles to overcome. “No one knows what the security agreement will say,” Trump shot back at a reporter. “What a dumb question.” Trump, who made initial comments as he welcomed Zelenskyy in the driveway of his Florida estate, said he didn’t have a hard deadline for a deal but asserted that talks are now in the “final stages.” “We’re going to see — otherwise [the war is] going to go on for a long time. It will either end or it’s going to go on a long time and millions of additional people are going to be killed, millions.” He intended to call Russian President Vladimir Putin, who he already spoke with on Sunday morning, again after sitting down with Zelenskyy. Zelenskyy has worked in recent weeks with European leaders and Trump’s top two interlocutors, special envoy Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner, the president’s son-in-law, to revise an initial 28-point plan offered by the White House. Trump and Zelensky sat inside an ornate dining room in Mar-a-Lago for their bilateral meeting, flanked by their respective delegations. The U.S. side included Secretary of State Marco Rubio and Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth, as well as Witkoff and Kushner. Zelenskyy said it was important to travel to the U.S. to discuss the plan with Trump in person to try to make progress on several unresolved issues, including territorial concessions in the Donbas, future control of the Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant and nailing down the specific American security guarantees that would serve as a deterrent to Russia eventually resuming the war. Zelenskyy, who Trump has pressured at times over the past year to “settle” the war, is again striving to demonstrate that Ukraine is far more willing to make concessions in pursuit of peace than Russia has seemed to be. “We want peace, and Russia demonstrates a desire to continue the war,” Zelenskyy told reporters on Saturday prior to arriving in Florida. “If anyone — whether the U.S. or Europe — is on Russia’s side, this means the war will continue.” Zelenskyy has also agreed to hold elections in Ukraine if a peace plan can be reached, a Russian demand that Trump has latched onto. The president said that there would be economic benefits for Ukraine once the war ends but was noncommittal when asked if the billions in Russia frozen assets would go to Ukraine to rebuild after the war ends. He appeared optimistic about peace talks while greeting the Ukrainian president, repeating his claim that both Ukraine and Russia want to see an end to the war. He also praised his European counterparts, calling them “terrific people” who want to get a peace deal done. Veronika Melkozerova contributed to this report.

KYIV — The latest draft of a peace plan agreed by U.S. and Ukrainian negotiators would see Kyiv withdrawing its troops from the eastern territories claimed by Moscow, according to Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy. Briefing reporters in Kyiv on Tuesday, Zelenskyy said the updated plan contemplated the designation of the eastern Donbas region — the majority of which is currently occupied by Moscow’s troops — as a demilitarized “free economic zone” in which neither Ukrainian nor Russian forces are present. Zelenskyy stressed that Ukraine is against the withdrawal, which is one of Russia’s top demands. But, he added, “there are two options: either the war continues, or something will have to be decided regarding all potential economic zones.” The Ukrainian leader said the latest version of the plan — an update of a Trump administration proposal that both Kyiv and the European Union had initially dismissed as a “non-starter” — maintains the proposed security guarantees from the U.S., NATO and European partners that are equivalent to those outlined in Article 5 of the transatlantic alliance’s treaty. “If Russia invades Ukraine, in addition to a coordinated military response, all global sanctions against Russia will be restored,” he said, adding that the guarantees would also be considered invalid if Kyiv takes any unprovoked military action against Moscow. Zelenskyy noted that Washington had dropped text from a previous version of the plan that proposed the U.S. receive compensation for the security guarantees. The plan additionally proposes Russia legally adopt a strategy of non-aggression towards Ukraine and Europe. The text also accepts Kyiv’s eventual accession to the European Union, acknowledges the country’s right to demand reparations from Russia, and endorses the creation of dedicated investment instruments to fund the country’s reconstruction. The revised text also calls for the joint administration of the Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant by Ukrainian, Russian and American authorities. Kyiv is loath to allow Moscow to manage the complex, which has been the site of fierce fighting, but is willing to partner with the Trump administration on running infrastructure Washington considers crucial for future minerals mining operations in the country. Zelenskyy said the nearby city of Enerhodar, which is currently occupied by Russia, would be a candidate for demilitarization if the U.S. insists on designating economic zones within Ukraine. But, he added, for the move to be legal, a referendum would have to be held to endorse that decision. The plan also calls on Ukraine and Russia to introduce programs in their educational curricula that promote tolerance of different cultures. Kyiv would additionally be expected to implement EU regulations to protect minority religions and languages. While those measures are likely to clash with Ukraine’s ongoing efforts to “de-Russify” the country and forge a new sense of nationhood, Zelenskyy said that adopting the rules are part of joining the EU, and he challenged Moscow to enact similar regulations, “if they dare.” The Trump administration’s original peace proposal was negotiated by U.S. envoy Steve Witkoff and Russian officials earlier this month. That 28-point document, which was widely interpreted to be molded to Moscow’s demands, has been substantially revised, and was the subject of trilateral talks held in Miami this past weekend. Trump last week said a peace deal is “closer than ever.” Zelenskyy on Wednesday told journalists that if an agreement is reached, a full ceasefire would enter into force immediately. Final approval of the document would require its ratification by the Ukrainian parliament, as well as its approval in a nationwide referendum.

PARIS — The military recruitment center across from the Eiffel Tower, in the posh 7th district’s historic École Militaire, is filled with promotional posters for the armed forces. In the lobby, I met 26-year-old Charlotte, who currently works in marketing for a private company but is considering joining the French army. “The geopolitical context is inspiring me to sign up and serve, using my skills,” she told me. “I’m sometimes wondering why I am doing marketing when I could be a linguist in the army or an intelligence agency.” The geopolitical context she’s referring to is obvious to everyone in France, which has been at the forefront of Europe’s efforts to cope with the changing U.S. attitude toward its NATO and EU allies. Charlotte, who I agreed to identify by her first name to protect her privacy, told me that she studied Russian and recognizes that Europeans need to become more “sovereign” because they cannot rely on U.S. President Donald Trump to defend the continent against Russia. And she’s ready to help. Trump continues to antagonize the United States’ traditional European allies, deriding them as he did in an interview with POLITICO earlier this month as “weak” and a “decaying group of nations.” And for its part, France wants to prove him wrong. Like many other European nations, France sees Russia has a growing threat to the continent. So it is preparing to defend itself against what the country’s chief of defense staff, Gen. Fabien Mandon, called a “violent test” from Russia in the next three to four years that it would need to counter without much, if any, help from Washington. To do that, France is boosting military spending, increasing weapons production and doubling the reserve forces. As of next year, France will also reintroduce voluntary military service for young adults, primarily 18- and 19-year-olds. The goal is to enroll 3,000 new recruits next summer, 10,000 in 2030 and 50,000 in 2035. These defense efforts come as most of Europe’s nations are having to rethink their security posture in the most meaningful way since the Cold War ended. The challenge is even higher as it’s becoming increasingly clear they can no longer rely on the United States as a primary security provider. Successive U.S. presidents — including Barack Obama and Joe Biden — have warned over the past decade that Washington would eventually have to focus on the Indo-Pacific region instead of Europe, but the Trump administration has already matched those words with action. That is putting the spotlight on France, the EU’s only nuclear power and a country with independent weapons makers that has long warned the continent should become more autonomous in areas such as technology and defense. According to Guillaume Lagane, an expert on defense policy and a teacher at the Sciences Po public research university, the way France and Germany, the EU’s largest countries, respond in the coming months and years will determine whether other European countries will turn to them for Europe’s defense or try to retain bilateral ties with Washington at the expense of EU and NATO unity. “If France and Germany propose credible options, European countries may hesitate, otherwise they will not,” he said. “If only the American guarantee is credible, they will do everything they can to buy it.” To come across as a credible leader, he added, France could look into stationing nuclear-capable Rafale fighter jets in Germany or Poland; compensate for the capability gaps potentially left behind by the U.S.; and replace U.S. soldiers who are leaving Europe with French troops. They are going to need a lot of Charlottes. In Paris’ corridors of power, the French elite has always known this moment would come. “We’re neither surprised, in shock or in denial,” a high-ranking French defense official told me in an interview. “Our first short-term test is Ukraine. We Europeans must organize ourselves to face this reality and adapt without being caught off guard.” For the past week, I’ve been talking to French and European officials in Paris and elsewhere to gauge how they are metabolizing the antagonism from Washington. In many cases, I agreed to withhold their names so they could speak more candidly at a moment of high tension with the United States and among European allies. France’s distrust of America dates back to 1956, when U.S. President Dwight Eisenhower forced it and Britain to back down from a military intervention to regain control of the Suez Canal from Egypt, leaving Paris feeling betrayed and humiliated. Since then, unlike most other European countries, France’s defense policy has been based on the assumption that the U.S. is not a reliable ally and that the Western European nation should be able to defend itself on its own if need be. The memory of the Suez incident contributed to former French President Charles de Gaulle’s decision to leave NATO and develop its own nuclear program. Now, European capitals — who until now have been reluctant to think about the continent’s security architecture without the U.S. — are starting to increasingly realize France might have been right all along. “There is a kind of intellectual validation of the French position, which recognizes that interests do not always converge between allies and that the U.S. involvement in European security was the result of an alignment that was not eternal,” said Élie Tenenbaum, director of the Paris-based IFRI security studies center. Since Trump came back to power in January, the clues of Washington’s disengagement from — if not disdain of — Europe have been hard to ignore. Trump’s disparaging comments about Europe earlier this month came only a few days after a U.S. National Security Strategy made thinly-veiled calls for regime change in European countries. A leaked longer version of the document openly says the U.S. should pull Austria, Hungary, Italy and Poland away from the EU. In the months leading up to the strategy’s release, the Trump administration has repeatedly cast doubt on America’s commitment to NATO’s collective defense pact, Article 5 of the NATO charter, and announced a U.S. troop reduction from frontline state Romania. Even more strikingly, the U.S. threatened to annex Greenland by force and is cozying up to Russia, including in peace talks to end the war in Ukraine. Less than one year after Trump returned to the White House, influential German voices — in one of Europe’s most transatlanticist countries — are no longer looking at Washington as an ally. Denmark’s military intelligence service has now classified the U.S. as a security risk. In this context, smaller European nations expect the larger ones to step up. “We need the bigger countries to lead the way,” a European defense official from a mid-size nation emphasized in a private briefing. “France has been consistent on that for quite some time, Germany is also important. It’s always helpful if they lead by example.” A Paris-based European diplomat echoed that call for French leadership: “We need Macron to take the initiative [on European defense], who else is going to do it if not France?” Another European official said France could become a “political and military hub,” adding that Paris is ready to lead together with other capitals such as London, Berlin, Rome and Warsaw. Since the war in Ukraine started in 2022, Paris has pivoted to Europe and reinvested in NATO. For decades, Paris had neglected the alliance — rejoining its integrated military command only in 2009 — and focused mainly on faraway lands such as the African Sahel region, from which the French military ultimately had to withdraw after a series of coups d’état. Now, France is leading a multinational NATO battlegroup in Romania, has beefed up its military footprint in Estonia and is in talks to deploy soldiers in Finland. For frontline states, having a nuclear power present on their soil remains a crucial deterrent against Russia. In a first test for Europe’s ability to think about its own security without the U.S., Paris — otherwise a laggard in terms of military aid to Kyiv — has set up alongside London a so-called coalition of the willing to plan security guarantees for post-war Ukraine. That’s a significant step in European-led defense planning and France’s leadership role has been welcomed in European capitals. However, many of them are still reluctant to deploy military assets to Ukraine without American backing. While the French elite has seen this moment coming, not everyone in France is on board, at least not yet. At this year’s Congress of France’s mayors — an influential gathering held annually in Paris — Mandon told the country’s local elected officials to ready their constituents for a potential war against Russia in the coming years. Standing on a white, round platform in front of French and EU flags, he warned them that France is in danger unless it’s prepared to sacrifice. “If our country falters because it is not prepared to accept losing its children …[or] … to suffer economically because priorities will go to defense production,” he said, “If we are not prepared for that, then we are at risk. But I think we have the moral fortitude.” About 24 hours later, that was all the country was talking about. Far-right and far-left parties alike accused Mandon of war-mongering and overstepping. It’s not up to him to speak to the mayors, they argued; his job is to follow political orders. Even in Emmanuel Macron’s camp, lawmakers privately admitted the general’s wording was ill-advised, even if the message was valid. Eventually, the French president publicly backed him. France’s moment to demonstrate leadership is arriving at a challenging time for Europe’s heavyweight. “If you’re right too early, then you’re wrong,” a high-ranking French military officer told me. Macron’s ill-fated decision to call for a snap election in 2024 has embroiled the country in a political crisis that is still unresolved, and the far-right, NATO-skeptic, EU-skeptic National Rally is on the rise and could come to power as soon as 2027. “Intellectually, we are mentally equipped to understand what is happening in terms of burden shifting, but we don’t really have the means to lead the way at the European level,” said IFRI’s Tenenbaum, adding that Germany is currently in a better position to do so. “French leadership makes sense, it is logical given our relative weight, experience, and capabilities, and European countries recognize this, but there is a mismatch between words and deeds,” he added. Even as Macron pledged more defense spending, it’s very unlikely that France’s fragmented National Assembly will pass the 2026 budget by Dec. 31. The French president said France’s military expenditures will increase by €6.7 billion next year, bringing the country’s total defense spending to more than €57.1 billion. In comparison, German lawmakers this week greenlit €50 billion in weaponry procurement — Germany’s military expenditures are expected to reach more than €82 billion next year. “There will be a new balance between France and Germany in the coming years,” said a third Paris-based European diplomat. Since Macron’s snap election in 2024, European embassies in Paris monitor France’s political situation like milk on the stove — especially in the run-up to a presidential election in 2027 where the far-right National Rally is currently leading the polls. While Germany and the U.K. could also see nationalists come to power, their next general elections aren’t scheduled before 2029. Paris-based European diplomats speaking to POLITICO have compared a presidency by National Rally leaders Marine Le Pen or Jordan Bardella to Trump’s return to the White House in terms of changes for France’s security and defense policy. Just a day after Macron pledged that France would join a multinational force to enforce peace in Ukraine if a deal is signed with Russia, Bardella, leader of the National Rally, reaffirmed his party’s opposition to sending French troops. Marine Le Pen confirmed in September she would leave NATO’s integrated command if she’s elected president. A second high-ranking French military officer downplayed that pledge, arguing top French military brass would be able to convince her otherwise. However, he conceded, the National Rally’s refusal to send boots on the ground in Ukraine would “become a problem” for the coalition of the willing. Le Pen also vowed to completely overturn Macron’s offer to have a discussion with European countries about how France’s nuclear deterrent could contribute to the bloc’s security. In a bid to show leadership, the French president is currently engaging with some nations to talk about the role French nukes could play to deter Russia beyond the French borders. Asked whether she’d be open to storing French nuclear weapons in Poland and Germany (something even Macron hasn’t suggested), she replied: “Give me a break. It’s an absolute no, because nuclear power belongs to the French.” Some European countries want to do as much as possible with Macron now, in anticipation of a potential drastic policy change in 2027. Others are concerned about France’s political future, worrying how a leadership change could affect Paris’ commitments. According to an influential French lawmaker who works on defense policy, Poland’s recent decision to award a submarine contract to Sweden instead of France was partly driven by concerns in Warsaw about France’s political future. “The instability of French political life is frightening. Poland is scared to death of Bardella,” the lawmaker said. Countries such as Romania continue to see France as a crucial security provider and would welcome more troops to compensate for the outgoing U.S. soldiers. But officials from the southeastern European country know there could be an expiration date to Paris’ involvement. “There is an election in two years’ time, Macron’s successor will be less inclined to have troops outside of France,” one of them told me. Amid the uncertainty, the French military will continue to try to strengthen the ranks of its armed forces and attract young people like Charlotte. She is still deciding whether she actually wants to join, and regardless of who’s elected president in 2027, the geopolitical environment is unlikely to improve. “It is very important that our generation is aware and knows how to serve their country,” she said.

President Donald Trump’s social media startup plans to merge with fusion company TAE Technologies in a deal valued at more than $6 billion. The all-stock transaction marks the latest twist surrounding Trump Media & Technology Group, the publicly traded parent company of Truth Social that has become a new pillar in Trump’s business empire over the last two years. Trump is the largest shareholder in the company, owning more than 114 million shares that were, as of Wednesday’s closing price, worth about $1.2 billion. Shareholders in Trump Media and TAE Technologies will own about 50 percent of the combined company on a fully diluted equity basis, the companies said Thursday. Trump Media’s stock, which trades under the ticker “DJT”, popped on the news — rising more than 20 percent shortly after. In merging with TAE Technologies, Trump Media is venturing into new territory once again. The company’s business has to date primarily revolved around advertising revenues generated through Truth Social, its prized asset. But Trump Media has recently branched out into other areas like the cryptocurrency markets and streaming. Still, the company has recorded several straight quarters of net losses, the latest of which came in at $54.8 million for the three months ended Sept. 30. Trump Media and TAE Technologies said in a statement that their merger will create “one of the world’s first publicly traded fusion companies.” They plan to begin work on building “the world’s first utility-scale fusion power plant” in 2026, according to the statement. “Trump Media & Technology Group built uncancellable infrastructure to secure free expression online for Americans, and now we’re taking a big step forward toward a revolutionary technology that will cement America’s global energy dominance for generations,” Trump Media CEO Devin Nunes said. “Fusion power will be the most dramatic energy breakthrough since the onset of commercial nuclear energy in the 1950s — an innovation that will lower energy prices, boost supply, ensure America’s A.I.-supremacy, revive our manufacturing base and bolster national defense.” Nunes will lead the joint company alongside TAE CEO Michl Binderbauer as co-CEOs, though the former Republican congressmember will still “lead all Trump Media brand operations,” the companies said. Nunes and Donald Trump Jr., who sits on Trump Media’s board and oversees the trust that holds his father’s shares in the company, will serve on the combined company’s board. The companies expect the deal to close in 2026, pending the necessary shareholder and regulatory approvals.

Slovakia’s populist Prime Minister Robert Fico announced that U.S. President Donald Trump has invited him to America to sign a nuclear power deal — and attend the FIFA World Cup next summer. “It is an honor for me that yesterday the special envoy of U.S. President D. Trump handed me a written invitation to visit the United States and meet with him,” Fico said in a social media post on Monday. “Together, we aim to support the signing of an intergovernmental agreement between the Slovak Republic and the United States on cooperation in nuclear energy and to exchange views on the most pressing global issues,” he added. “The timeframe of my visit will coincide with the celebrations of the 250th anniversary of U.S. independence and the hosting of the FIFA World Cup.” The invitation comes on the heels of the Dec. 4 publication of the U.S. National Security Strategy, which caused an uproar in Europe for suggesting that the Trump administration will support ideologically aligned European patriotic parties, such as Fico’s leftist-populist and nationalist Smer. Late last week, U.S. Ambassador to France Charles Kushner met with senior figures from that country’s far-right opposition National Rally, while U.S. Under Secretary of State Sarah Rogers met with opposition far-right Alternative for Germany (AfD) party politician Markus Frohnmaier in Washington. The letter from Trump, dated Dec. 11, was given to Fico by U.S. Deputy Energy Secretary James Danly, who was in Bratislava this week. “Our relationship means a great deal to me and reflects the strength of the tremendous bond between the United States of America and Slovakia. Our countries have never been closer. I am confident that, by continuing to work together, we will achieve even greater things — including formalizing our civil nuclear cooperation,” Trump wrote in the letter. Washington and Bratislava are preparing to sign a nuclear power deal that will formally tap Westinghouse, the major American nuclear power company, to build a new nuclear reactor in western Slovakia, with costs estimated at €13 billion to €15 billion. The decision was announced earlier in July and drew criticism from the Slovak opposition after Fico’s government bypassed the tender process to award what is the largest investment project in Slovakia’s history. Slovakia faces a football playoff in March against Kosovo, and then a potential final qualifier against Turkey or Romania in order to reach the 2026 Men’s World Cup in the U.S., Canada and Mexico.

The U.S. is offering Ukraine security guarantees similar to those it would receive as part of NATO, American officials said Monday. The offer is the strongest and most explicit security pledge the Trump administration has put forward for Ukraine, but it comes with an implicit ultimatum: Take it now or the next iteration won’t be as generous. The proposal of so-called Article 5-like guarantees comes amid marathon talks among special envoy Steve Witkoff, President Donald Trump’s son-in-law and adviser Jared Kushner and Ukrainian and European officials in Berlin as Washington tries to pressure Kyiv into accepting terms that will end the war. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy and many European leaders have been reluctant to reach a deal without an explicit U.S. security guarantee, fearful that Russia, after a period of time, would attack again. This latest U.S. offer appears to be an effort to assuage those concerns but also to push Zelenskyy to act quickly. “The basis of that agreement is basically to have really, really strong guarantees, Article 5-like,” a senior U.S. official said. “Those guarantees will not be on the table forever. Those guarantees are on the table right now if there’s a conclusion that’s reached in a good way.” President Donald Trump said later Monday that he had spoken with Zelenskyy and European leaders by phone. Trump also said he had spoken to Russian President Vladimir Putin, but did not say when. “I think we’re closer now than we have been ever, and we’ll see what we can do,” Trump told reporters at the White House. Asked if the offer for security guarantees had a time limit, he said “the time limit is whenever we can get it done.” The discussions over the weekend largely focused on detailing the security guarantees that the U.S. and Europe would provide Ukraine, but they also included territory and other matters. Witkoff and Kushner were joined by Gen. Alexus Grynkewich, head of U.S. European Command as well as the top commander for NATO. The U.S. expects that Russia would accept such an arrangement in a final deal, as well as permit Ukraine to join the European Union. That could prove to be an overly optimistic assessment, given the Kremlin’s refusal to give ground in peace talks so far. And Moscow has yet to weigh in on any of the new agreements being worked out in Europe over the last few days. “We believe the Russians, in a final deal, will accept all these things which allow for a strong and free Ukraine. Russia, in a final deal, has indicated they were open to Ukraine joining the EU,” a second U.S. official said. Both officials were granted anonymity because of the sensitive nature of the negotiations. It was not clear when or how the Trump administration would bring the new details to Moscow. Russia expects the U.S. side will update it on the talks, Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov said. He added Putin “is open to peace, to a serious peace and serious decisions. He is absolutely not open to any tricks aimed at stalling for time.” The Kremlin said Monday it expected to be updated on the Berlin talks by the U.S. side. Asked whether the negotiations could be over by Christmas, Peskov said trying to predict a potential time frame for a peace deal was a “thankless task.” The second U.S. official said the Ukrainian delegation was pleasantly “surprised” by Trump’s willingness to agree to firmer security guarantees and to have them ratified by Congress so that they will endure beyond his presidency. The U.S. side also spoke highly of its European counterparts, who have been worried for months that the Trump team would force Ukraine to agree to unfavorable conditions. European officials also sounded upbeat. “The legal and material security guarantees that the U.S. has put on the table here in Berlin are remarkable,” German Chancellor Friedrich Merz told reporters during a press conference after the talks Monday. Merz, along with his counterparts from Denmark, Finland, France, Italy, the Netherlands, Norway, Poland, U.K., Sweden and the EU put out a statement welcoming “significant progress” in the U.S. effort and committing to helping Ukraine to end the war and deter Russian aggression, including through a European-led multinational force for Ukraine supported by the U.S. Over the weekend Zelenskyy conceded that Ukraine would not seek NATO membership, a condition that Russia has repeatedly sought. Trump, who skipped this week’s meetings in Berlin but has been briefed twice by Witkoff and Kushner, planned to call into a dinner Monday for attending heads of state, foreign ministers and security officials, the U.S. officials said. “He’s really pleased with where [things] are,” the first U.S. official said. Witkoff and Kushner also sought to narrow disputes between Ukraine and Russia over what territory Moscow would control in a final deal. Russia has so far insisted on controlling Ukraine’s eastern Donbas region, even parts that Moscow hasn’t captured. One of the U.S. officials said the talks focused on many of the specific territorial considerations, stating that there is a proposal in the works but yet to be finalized for Russia and Ukraine to split control of the Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant with each country having access to half of the energy produced by the plant. But the American officials mostly avoided specifics on how they aimed to bridge other gaps on territorial disputes. They said they left Zelenskyy with “thought-provoking ideas” on how to do so. After Zelenskyy responds to the proposals, Witkoff and Kushner will discuss the matter with Russia. “We feel really good about the progress that we’ve made, including on territories,” the first official said. Next the U.S. will convene working groups, likely in Miami this weekend, where military officials will pore over maps to solve the remaining territorial issues. “We believe that we have probably solved for … 90 percent of the issues between Ukraine and Russia, but there’s some more things that have to be worked out,” the first U.S. official said. Hans Joachim Von Der Burchard in Berlin contributed to this report.

BELÉM, Brazil — Gavin Newsom can’t get out of a meeting or a talk at the international climate talks here without being swarmed by reporters and diplomats eager for a quote, a handshake, a photo. On a tour Tuesday of a cultural center with Gov. Helder Barbalho, the leader of the Brazilian state hosting the talks, a passerby recognized them both. “There’s the governor,” he exclaimed. “And there’s the California governor.” Later in the day, as Newsom rode up an escalator packed with reporters and international officials on his way to deliver a speech, a bystander shouted: “The escalator’s not broken for you!” — a dig at President Donald Trump, who once had an escalator malfunction on him at the United Nations. Newsom grinned wide: “Oh, I like that.” The adulation was gold for a governor with presidential aspirations as he steps into a power vacuum. The Trump administration is trying to dismantle climate policies both at home and abroad, and other likely Democratic presidential contenders are absent from the United Nations climate talks. Seeing a chance to plant his green flag on an international stage, Newsom is embracing the role of climate champion as his own party backs away at home and the politics of the issue shift rightward. It’s a role fitting Newsom’s instincts: anti-Trump, pro-environment and pro-technology, and with a political antenna for the upside of picking fights, finding opportunity in defiance. “We’re at peak influence because of the flatness of the surrounding terrain with the Trump administration and all the anxiety,” he told POLITICO from the sidelines of a green investor conference in Brazil on Monday. Newsom’s profile has never been higher. Just days before traveling to Brazil, he celebrated a decisive win in his redistricting campaign to boost Democrats in the midterms. He is polling at or near the top of presidential primary shortlists, and is amassing an army of small-dollar donors across the states. The governor couldn’t walk down the hallway at the conference without getting swarmed, undeniably the star of the talks on their second formal day. At one point, security officials had to physically shove away one man repeatedly. Conference attendees yelled out “Keep up the social media!” and “Go Gavin!” (and the occasional “Who is that?”). The first question by the Brazilian press: Are you running for president? And from business people: Are you coming back? Yet in touching down here — and in emphasizing his climate advocacy more broadly — Newsom is assuming a significant risk to his post-gubernatorial ambitions. The rest of the world may wish America were more like California, but the country itself — even Democrats who will decide the 2028 primary — are far more skeptical. What looks like courage abroad can read as out-of-touch back home, in a country where voters, including Democrats, routinely rank any number of issues, including the economy, health care, and cost-of-living, as more pressing than global warming. THE STAGE IS SET Other blue states were already backing away from Newsom’s gas-powered vehicle phase-out even before Congress and Trump ended it this summer, and another possible Democratic contender for president, Pennsylvania Gov. Josh Shapiro, may pull his state out of a regional emissions trading market as part of a budget deal, a move seen as tempering attacks from the right on climate. Even in California, where a new Carnegie Endowment for International Peace poll finds that Californians increasingly want their state government to play a bigger role on the international stage, trade trumped climate change as voters’ top priority for international talks for the first time this year. “There’s not a poll or a pundit that suggests that Democrats should be talking about this,” Newsom acknowledged in an interview. “I’m not naive to that either, but I think it’s the way we talk about it that’s the bigger issue, and I think all of us, including myself, need to improve on that and that’s what I aim to do.” In his 2020 presidential campaign, Joe Biden prevailed not after embracing — but rather, distancing himself from — the “Green New Deal,” which Newsom acknowledged this month had become a “pejorative” on the right. Four years later, Trump pilloried Kamala Harris in the general election for her past positions on climate change. Newsom is already facing relentless attacks from the right on energy: two years ago, in what was seen at the time as a shadow presidential debate, Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis was skewering Newsom for his phase-out of gas-powered vehicles: “He is walking his people into a big-time disaster,” DeSantis said. And that was before Republicans began combing Newsom’s social media posts for material to weaponize in future ads. Even Newsom’s predecessor, former Gov. Jerry Brown, who made climate change his signature issue, acknowledged “climate is not the big issue in South Carolina or in Maine or in Iowa.” “Climate is important,” Brown said in an interview. “But it’s not like immigration, it’s not like homelessness, it’s not like taxes, it’s not like inflation, not like the price of a house.” Still, Brown cast climate as an existential issue. “It’s way beyond presidential politics. It is about our survival and your well being for the rest of your life,” he said. “I think he’s doing it because he thinks it’s profoundly important, and certainly politics is not divorced entirely from reality.” Newsom’s inner circle senses a political upside, too. His first-ever visit to the climate talks comes not just from his own or California’s ambitions, but from the vacuum left by Trump. “The more that Trump recedes, like a tide going out, the more coral is exposed. And that’s where Newsom can really flourish,” said Jason Elliott, a former deputy chief of staff and an adviser since Newsom’s early days in elected office. Newsom is “going against the grain,” he continued. “It’s easier to be some of these purple or red state governors in other places in the United States that just wash their hands of EVs the minute that the going gets tough. But that’s just not Newsom.” On climate, Newsom’s attempts to stand alone sit well within the California tradition. Brown and Arnold Schwarzenegger — the Democrat and the Republican who preceded him — both made international climate diplomacy central to their legacies. “We have been at this for decades and decades, through Republican and Democratic administrations,” Newsom said. “That’s an important message at this time as well, because we’re so unreliable as a nation, and we’re destroying alliances and relationships.” Also in Brazil for part of the talks were Govs. Tony Evers of Wisconsin and Michelle Lujan Grisham of New Mexico, both Democrats, and mayors of several major U.S. cities, like Kate Gallego of Phoenix. But their pitch didn’t land with quite the same heft as California’s, a state filled with billion-dollar tech companies that, as Newsom frequently boasts, recently overtook Japan as the world’s fourth-largest economy. He attributed his environmental streak to his family, citing his father, William Newsom, a judge and longtime conservationist. As mayor of San Francisco, Newsom signed a first-in-the-nation composting mandate and plastic bag ban. As lieutenant governor to Brown, Newsom called himself “a solution in search of a problem” because Brown had embraced climate so prominently. But Brown said Newsom has made the issue his own. “I think Newsom comes to this naturally,” he said. Newsom pulls from a wide range of influences; prolific texting buddies include former Washington Gov. Jay Inslee, who ran for president largely on a climate platform, and former Secretary of State John Kerry. He frequently cites the example of President Ronald Reagan, the Republican — and former California governor — who embraced an environmental agenda. “I talk to everybody,” Newsom said. He spoke in almost spiritual terms about his upcoming trip deeper into the Amazon, where he’s scheduled to meet with community stewards and walk through the forest. “When we were all opening up those first books, learning geography, one of the first places we all learn about is the Amazon,” he said. “It’s so iconic, so evocative, so it informs so much of what inspires us as children to care about the Earth and Mother Nature. It connects us to our creator.” THE MID-TRANSITION HURT As governor, Newsom hasn’t had the luxury his predecessors enjoyed of setting ambitious emissions targets, but instead is working in a period beset by natural disasters and tensions with both the left and moderate wings of his party. His aides have dubbed it the remarkably un-sexy “mid-transition”: The deadlines to show results are here, they’re out of reach — and in the interim, voters are mad about energy prices. As a result, he’s pushed to ban the sale of new gas-powered cars by 2035 and directed billions toward wildfire prevention and clean-energy manufacturing — but also reversed past positions against nuclear and Big Oil, including extending the life of California’s last nuclear power plant, pausing a profit cap on refineries and expanding oil drilling in Kern County. Inside the administration, those moves are seen as not a tempering of environmental ambition but a pragmatic recalibration. “We’re transitioning to the other side, and there’s a lot of white water in that. And that’s reality. You’ve got to deal with cards that are dealt,” Newsom said in an interview in São Paulo. But it also exposes him to criticism from both the left and moderate wings of his own party. Newsom’s 2023 speech excoriating oil companies to the United Nations in New York City was one of his proudest moments of his career. This year, he faced banners attacking him: “If you can’t take on Big Oil, can you take on Trump?” At the same time, former Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa, a Democrat, has seized on high gas prices in his campaign to succeed Newsom as governor in 2026 — and is partly blaming past governors’ climate policies. Adding to the crunch are the record-setting wildfires that have beset Newsom’s tenure as governor. They’ve not only devastated communities from Paradise in Northern California to Altadena in Los Angeles County but buoyed both electricity prices as utilities spend billions on fire-proofing their grid and property insurance prices as insurers flee the state. It’s this duality that informs Newsom’s approach. “We’ve got to address costs or we’ll lose the debate,” Newsom said. “This is the hard part.” A business moderate known to hand out personal phones programmed with his number to tech CEOs, Newsom is now pitching his climate fight as one focused on economic competitiveness and jobs. Lauren Sanchez, the chair of the state’s powerful air and climate agency, the California Air Resources Board, called the state’s international leadership the governor’s “north star” on climate change. “He is in the business of ensuring that California is relevant in the future economy,” she said. In Brazil, Newsom made the time to stop by a global investors summit in São Paulo, where he held an hour-long roundtable with green bankers, philanthropists and energy execs. They told him they wanted his climate pacts with Brazilian governments to do more on economic ties. So, Newsom said, he started drafting a new agreement there and then, throwing a paper napkin on the table in reference to the cocktail napkin deal that formed Southwest. “Let’s get this done before I leave,” Newsom said he told his Brazilian counterparts. “We move quickly.” If the moment reflected California’s swagger, it also laid bare its limitations. The Constitution limits states from contributing money to international funds, like the tropical rainforest preservation fund that is the Brazilians’ signature proposal at the talks. And even at home, Trump is still making Newsom’s balancing act hard: Newsom floated backfilling the Trump administration’s removal of electric vehicle incentives with state rebates, then backtracked, conceding the state doesn’t have enough funds. And on Tuesday, reports came out that the Trump administration was planning to offer offshore oil and gas leases for the first time in decades off the coast of California — putting Newsom on the defensive. Newsom called those plans “dead on arrival.” “I also think it remarkable that he didn’t promote it in his backyard at Mar-a-Lago; he didn’t promote it off the coast of Florida,” Newsom added.

NEWPORT, Wales — Road signs around Newport still refer to this sprawling former industrial site as a radiator factory. But soon, it will generate a different kind of heat. Microsoft has chosen this area of South Wales — once the world’s steel capital — to build hulking new data centers. Five buildings, covering an area larger than three football pitches, are springing up to meet what the company describes as “exploding demand” for artificial intelligence compute power.  For Microsoft, the area’s industrial heritage is precisely why it’s investing. Newport’s legacy of heavy-duty factories means it has the infrastructure needed for energy-intensive data centers. But doubts over whether Britain can supply enough energy to keep up with demand from data centers are an urgent problem for the government’s AI ambitions. The government’s former AI adviser Matt Clifford has warned that without energy and planning reform, new data center projects and the billions of pounds of investment they bring are at risk.  Britain’s industrial electricity prices are 60 percent higher than the average of countries in the International Energy Agency, and waits for a grid connection can stretch to a decade.  “We had the biggest AI funders in the world lining up to invest tens of billions into our infrastructure if only we could sort out our energy mess,” Clifford said at an event about his time in No.10. U.S. Ambassador to the U.K. Warren Stephens, Donald Trump’s point man in London, is also watching closely, calling Britain’s energy costs the country’s “chief obstacle” to growth. “If there are not major reforms to U.K. energy policy, then the U.K.’s position as a premier destination in the global economy is vulnerable,” Stephens warned a business gathering in London. A TALL ORDER The Newport project will need 80MW of energy – enough to power a small town – but the Department for Science, Innovation and Technology (DSIT) predicts the country needs to boost its total data center capacity five-fold by 2035, from 1.8GW to 9.6GW. That expansion will mean data centers’ power total demand will treble over the same period, according to NESO, the body which manages U.K. electricity demand. A spokesperson for the DSIT said it was looking at “bespoke options” to support data centers’ energy demands, adding: “The work of our AI Energy Council — bringing together regulators, energy companies and tech firms — will ensure we can do that using responsible, sustainable sources.” AI Minister Kanishka Narayan told a conference for AI researchers in London in October that there was “no better place to build” than Britain, arguing its combination of talent, access to capital and large public markets is unmatched. Investors aren’t so sure.  “People aren’t willing to pay a premium on U.K. power rates to run their workloads here,” Mike Mattacola, international general manager at AI infrastructure company CoreWeave said at the same conference. “We need to fix that.” SELLING THE SHOVELS It’s not just energy prices that are the problem. The boss of Hitachi Energy U.K., which is working with the National Grid to upgrade Britain’s power network, warned that the grid is the biggest hurdle to Britain’s AI ambitions. Laura Fleming said data centers should be at “the heart” of the country’s energy planning, but added: “I’m still not sure whether as the U.K. we have sufficiently planned for this.”  More than half all applications for a grid connection are now made by data centers, according to the National Grid. Energy regulator Ofgem is trying to get a grip of things, grumbling that amid the “credible data center projects” applying for a grid connection, they want to get rid of “less viable projects that may crowd out those with genuine merit.” Power providers, meantime, are lining up to find the opportunities in this uncertainty. Two hundred miles to the north of Newport, the U.K.’s largest power station is offering itself as one solution. Drax Power Station burns wood pellets imported from North America and wants to build data centers hooked up to its four biomass terminals.  Richard Gwilliam, director of future operations, revealed that Drax has already held talks with hyperscalers and plans to bring a data center online in the early 2030s. He hoped the 2.6-gigawatt power station could offer “big scale stuff” to the market. Gwilliam also said the existing connections gave biomass a trump card to play in the data center race. SQUARING THE CIRCLE The rush for power is also clashing with Britain’s net zero ambitions. The most in-demand energy source for data centers is still fossil fuels, specifically gas. National Gas said it has had inquiries from five big data center projects since last November, equivalent to 2.5GW worth of energy capacity, or twice the capacity of Britain’s biggest nuclear power station, Sizewell B.  Its chief commercial officer, Ian Radley, argued gas provided customers with “the flexibility and capacity they need to enable the Government’s strategic AI ambitions.”  But environmental groups point out that the surge in carbon emissions from new data centers have not been factored in to the  U.K.’s Carbon Budget Delivery Plan, which sets out a path for the government to hit legally-binding climate goals up to 2037.  “It’s unclear how the government intends to square the circle of encouraging a construction frenzy of new, highly polluting data centers while not overshooting the binding climate targets they need to meet,” said Donald Campbell, director of advocacy at campaign group Foxglove. This tension is also being played out at the AI Energy Council, a body the government formed in January to bring AI and energy companies together, but which has only met twice.  It is co-chaired by two ministers with different priorities. Ed Miliband, as energy secretary, needs to cut Britain’s emissions to zero by 2050, while Technology Secretary Liz Kendall needs to turn AI’s promises of investment and growth, particularly to left-behind areas, into a reality.  The government has pushed the idea AI Growth Zones — huge data center campuses on former industrial land, which already have grid connections and will get fast-tracked through planning — as a solution. One has already been announced in Northumberland, but a decision on a second, planned for Teesside in north-east England, has been delayed until the end of this year by Miliband, whose department has to make a call on whether to greenlight plans for a hydrogen plant on the same site, which could preclude data centers being built there. “There is a large fight going on inside of government where Ed Miliband seems to have set himself up against not just the prime minister, but a number of secretaries of state,” Houchen told POLITICO during Conservative Party Conference in October.  THE NUCLEAR OPTION Long term, the government is betting on a cleaner, but more expensive energy source — nuclear, specifically small modular reactors. Michael Jenner, CEO of nuclear firm Last Energy UK, said they had received dozens of enquiries from data center builders and argued that the green credentials of nuclear was an ace card it could play against rival bids from gas companies.   “If you’re thinking about building data centers in South Wales, which a lot of people are, you have a problem with the authorities because they don’t want new gas there,” he said.  In September, EDF Energy announced plans to work with American company Holtec International building a crop of data centers next to small modular nuclear reactors at a disused coal plant in Nottinghamshire.  The Tony Blair Institute, which is influential with government ministers, has argued nuclear has a “unique” advantage when it comes to data centers. It also believes the country should scale back its net zero plans in favor of reducing energy costs to attract data center investment.  “Cheap, firm power is … not a ‘nice to have’ but a prerequisite for attracting AI-driven growth,” it argued in a report last month. Gas, meanwhile, should be part of that energy mix, the Institute recommended in July. Firms represented at the AI Energy Council have urged ministers to green-light greater use of gas turbines in the short term. The clock is ticking. Gas, nuclear, renewables or even wooden pellets — ministers willing on an AI revolution need to make decisions fast.  

KYIV — Top corruption watchdogs said they carried out dozens of raids Monday across Ukraine during an investigation into the energy sector. The National Anti-Corruption Bureau of Ukraine (NABU) and the Special Anti-Corruption Prosecutor’s Office (SAP) are probing top officials at Ukraine’s state energy companies, including nuclear energy operator Energoatom. Searches took place two days after Russia launched its largest attack yet against the Ukrainian energy system, including nuclear plants and electric substations, and hammered power operator Сentrеgenergo’s electricity-generating capacity. Lengthy blackouts are still occurring throughout the country, as authorities struggle to restore power, while Ukrainians question whether energy facilities were properly protected from Russian attacks. NABU said its 15-month investigation and 1,000 hours of wiretapping involving the bureau’s entire staff culminated Monday in 70 raids. Some of the wiretappings were from July, the same month Ukraine’s government and parliament tried to strip NABU of its independence and bring it under political control, citing Russian influence on the bureau — in a move that was later reversed following nationwide protests. NABU refused to reveal the names of the main suspects in the corruption probe, but said there were noted businesspeople and energy officials among the alleged perpetrators.  The main goal of the scheme they co-organized, according to NABU, was to obtain illegal benefits amounting to 10-15 percent of a state contract value — theoretically running into the millions of euros — from counterparts of Energoatom, including companies involved in building protective structures for energy infrastructure. Energoatom declined to comment due to the ongoing investigation.

Five drones were spotted flying over Belgium’s Doel nuclear power plant near the Port of Antwerp on Sunday evening, energy company Engie said. “Initially we had detected three drones, but then we saw five drones. They were up in the air for about an hour,” Engie spokesperson Hellen Smeets told POLITICO Monday morning. The first report of the three drones came shortly before 10 p.m. on Sunday, Smeet said, adding that the sightings had no impact on the plant operations. Belgium’s national Crisis Center, which is currently monitoring the situation, confirmed the incident. Earlier in the evening, air traffic at Liège Airport was briefly suspended after multiple drone reports, with flights halted around 7:30 p.m. and resuming less than an hour later. The latest incidents comes amid a surge of drone activity disrupting key infrastructure across Belgium. Airports in Brussels and Liège faced repeated interruptions last week, while drones were also spotted over military bases and the Port of Antwerp. Belgium held a National Security Council meeting Thursday, after which Interior Minister Bernard Quintin said that authorities had the situation “under control.” While the government has avoided attributing blame, Belgium’s intelligence services suspect foreign hands, with Moscow seen as the most likely source, according to local media. Defense Minister Theo Francken said Saturday that “Russia is clearly a plausible suspect.” On Sunday, the U.K. announced it will join France and Germany in sending personnel and equipment to help Belgium counter drone incursions around sensitive sites.