WP: The assistance for Ukraine is due to run out in the coming months, and Trump has not signaled plans to revive or extend it

These could be the last deliveries of US military equipment to Ukraine...

The State and Treasury departments have each been drafting potential sanctions packages against Russia that would focus on those sectors, one diplomat familiar with the discussions said for ‘The Washington Post’. The same teams have also been assessing the effectiveness of the current sanctions regime and contemplating the rollback of certain existing sanctions, said the diplomat, who, like others, spoke on the condition of anonymity to speak frankly about closed-door talks.

But any shift would depend on the personal preference of Trump, who has made clear that he alone is the arbiter of U.S. policy. For now, there has been no action either to pressure Putin or boost Ukraine, which is still receiving the final tranches of military aid approved during the Biden administration. That assistance is due to run out in the coming months, and Trump has not signaled plans to revive or extend it, putting Kyiv in an uncertain strategic position.

“There is a choice facing the current administration, which is to authorize additional security assistance for Ukraine so they continue to receive the weapons,” said David Shimer, the former Ukraine director on President Joe Biden’s National Security Council. “Or to chart a different course, which is to let U.S. security assistance wind down, which would disadvantage Ukraine, play to Russia’s advantage.”

For years, Trump has heralded his close relationship with Putin, described the trust he believes exists between the two and downplayed the role of Russian aggression in the war in Ukraine. He has blamed Ukraine for getting invaded and blasted Biden for allowing it.

Through it all, Trump has been solicitous toward the Russian leader, lauding last week his “good conversation with a nice gentleman named Vladimir Putin” in which “the tone and spirit of the conversation were excellent.”

Trump made plain his desire to move beyond the war to revive U.S.-Russia trade ties, despite Putin’s spurning the U.S. president’s demand for an immediate ceasefire, which Ukraine has embraced. In a call with European leaders after the conversation with Putin, Trump said that the Russian leader did not appear ready for peace, a second diplomat said.

Trump has occasionally flared his frustration with Putin’s continued assault on Ukraine — though he has taken no steps to do anything about it…

Taylor said that increased sanctions on Russia, renewed military support for Ukraine and an encouragement to Europeans to use $300 billion in frozen Russian sovereign assets to help Kyiv could all serve to flip Putin’s calculus about coming to the bargaining table.

Some in the Trump administration have been lukewarm about the measures until now.

“If you start threatening sanctions, the Russians will stop talking,” Secretary of State Marco Rubio told the Senate Foreign Relations Committee last week. “And there is value in us being able to talk to them and to drive them to get to the table.”

The concern stands in stark contradiction to Trump’s strategy on economic coercion, which he has embraced as a negotiating tactic in almost every other circumstance: against the European Union, China, Harvard and law firms he views as critical of his actions.

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