BREAKING: President Trump to meet with Russian President Putin in Alaska August 15

"The highly anticipated meeting between myself, as President of the United States of America, and President Vladimir Putin, of Russia, will take place next Friday, August 15, 2025, in the Great State of Alaska. Further details to follow. Thank you for your attention to this matter!"

The last time Putin met with an American president in the US was in 2015 when he met with President Barack Obama at a meeting of the UN General Assembly in New York.

Trump spoke about the meeting to reporters on Friday, saying that there would be some consideration given to a territory swap between the two nations. "I think we’re getting very close, and we’re going to be announcing later on — we’re going to have a meeting with Russia, start off with Russia," Trump said.

"And we’ll announce the location," he said ahead of announcing just that, "I think the location will be a very popular one for a lot of reasons. But we’ll be announcing that a little bit later; I just don’t want to do it now because of the importance of what we just did."

Trump took questions about his efforts to end the war, while he was meeting with the heads of Armenia and Azerbaijan and brokering a peace between those countries.

As to what the territorial exchanges could look like, Trump said "You’re looking at territory that’s been fought over for three and a half years. A lot of Russians have died, a lot of Ukrainians. So we’re looking at that, but we’re actually to get some back and some swapping.

"It’s complicated," he continued. "It’s actually — nothing easy. It’s very complicated. But we’re going to get some back. And we’re going to get some switched. They’ll be some swapping of territories to the betterment of both, but we’ll be talking about that either later or tomorrow or whatever."

If this meeting is successful a follow-up meeting including Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky might be possible. Trump said "we have a shot at it," and said regarding the war "we're going to get it solved."

"European leaders want to see peace, President Putin, I believe, wants to see peace, and Zelensky wants to see peace," Trump said.

As for Zelensky, he said, who has also been reticent to come to an agreement that would cede territory to Russia, "Now, President Zelensky has to get all of his, everything he needs, because he’s going to have to get ready to sign something and I think he’s working hard to get that done."

Alaska is the state that is geographically closest to Russia, with the eastern most part of the massive nation visible from the 49th state. The war began in February 2022 when Russia invaded their neighbor Ukraine.