Zelenskyy says he and Trump had ‘good meeting’ about Patriot missiles at White House

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said he discussed Patriot air defences and the prospects for renewed diplomacy during a meeting with U.S. President Donald Trump, although there were few public signs of progress as Kyiv seeks to bolster its military capabilities against Russia.

The visits to the White House and, later, to Capitol Hill on Tuesday came as Zelenskyy seeks vital U.S. weapons to strengthen his country’s ability to defend against Russian missile and drone strikes that have battered its cities.

The Ukrainian leader said in a social media post that he and Trump had a “good meeting” and discussed licenses for Patriot interceptor production and several other ideas. He reiterated Ukraine’s needs during a meeting hours later with senators.

“Of course, I shared what we need, our needs. I shared it with the president today. I was thankful to him for this meeting, and now I shared with senators,” Zelenskyy told reporters. “So we will try to manage it. It’s a big, big challenge.”

His chief of staff said the two sides had “agreed to intensify the negotiation process at all levels.” Zelenskyy scored a win earlier this month when he met with Trump at the NATO summit in Turkey, with the U.S. president agreeing to let Ukraine manufacture Patriot missile interceptors.

On Capitol Hill, Zelenskyy, who attended the funeral of Senator Lindsey Graham at the National Cathedral on Tuesday, expressed confidence that “Ukraine really can produce everything.”

Building its own Patriots, though, could take considerable time and Zelenskyy is eager to obtain more immediate help to repel Russian assaults with the war now in its fifth year.

“There are reasons to be somewhat skeptical,” said Max Bergmann, director of the Europe, Russia, and Eurasia Program at the Center for Strategic International Studies. Though “it may not be applicable in the battlefield in 2026 or 2027,” it’s still a good partnership to have for Ukraine, he added.

Co-production of the in-demand interceptors would “probably take years,” George Beebe, a former CIA analyst who is director of grand strategy at the Quincy Institute for Responsible Statecraft, told reporters at a briefing on Tuesday.

Zelenskyy said he also met on Tuesday with representatives from Lockheed Martin Corp., which produces missiles for the Patriot defences. In a post on X, he said teams were “already working on specific solutions to move to co-production as quickly as possible.” Last week, Zelenskyy met with a team from Raytheon, which is a contractor for the overall Patriot system.

Following Trump and Zelenskyy’s meeting, White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt called it — and a separate White House session between Trump and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu — “positive and productive.”

Zelenskyy and Trump have had a rocky relationship earlier in the U.S. president’s second term, but that dynamic has warmed. At the NATO summit, Trump praised his Ukrainian counterpart as doing an “amazing job,” a recognition of Kyiv’s battlefield gains.

Ukraine has slowed Russian advances on the battlefield while the country’s drone prowess has enabled frequent long-range strikes targeting oil and military installations deep in Russian territory. Those strikes are escalating the war’s strain on Russia’s economy, driving up fuel and transportation costs.

Still, Moscow has intensified missile and drone attacks while insisting Ukraine concede to sweeping concessions to end the war, including giving up land Russia hasn’t been able to conquer. Diplomatic efforts to end the conflict have stalled, and Ukraine has long maintained that’s because their Russian counterparts aren’t seriously interested in a diplomatic solution.