President Donald Trump lashed out at the criticism he’s faced for his Alaska summit with Russian President Vladimir Putin last week, which failed to result in a ceasefire in the war in Ukraine.

“The Fake News has been saying for 3 days that I suffered a ‘major defeat’ by allowing President Vladimir Putin of Russia to have a major Summit in the United States,” Trump wrote on Sunday evening in a Truth Social post that did not mention the outcome of the summit. “Actually, he would have loved doing the meeting anywhere else but the US, and the Fake News knows this. It was a major point of contention!”

Trump argued that his critics wouldn’t have been pleased even “if we had the Summit elsewhere” because “the Democrat run and controlled media would have said what a terrible thing THAT was.”

Claiming “these people are sick,” Trump transitioned into boasting about improving the crime in Washington, DC, and his efforts to “secure [the] Southern Border.”

“They even want CRIME IN D.C., and other BLUE Cities throughout our Country, but don’t worry, I won’t let that happen. Just like our now secure Southern Border (ZERO illegals in last 3 months!), our cities will be Secure and Safe, and D.C. will lead the way!”

The president followed up his lengthy comments by attacking Senator Chris Murphy (Democrat, Connecticut), who had slammed the Trump-Putin summit as an “embarrassment to the United States” Sunday while appearing on NBC’s Meet the Press.

“The very unattractive (both inside and out!) Senator from Connecticut, Chris Murphy, said ‘Putin got everything that he wanted.’ Actually, ‘nobody got anything,’ too soon, but getting close,” Trump wrote in a separate Truth Social post Sunday. “Murphy is a lightweight who thinks it made the Russian President look good in coming to America. Actually, it was very hard for President Putin to do so.”

Wrapping up his post, Trump also called out his former national security adviser John Bolton, who told CNN that Putin had “won the summit” over a “tired” Trump.

“This war can be ended, NOW, but stupid people like Chris Murphy, John Bolton, and others, make it much harder to do so,” Trump added.

Just minutes later, Trump directed his attention to Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy, arguing that Zelenskyy could “end the war with Russia almost immediately if he wants to.” He then bashed former President Barack Obama.

“President Zelenskyy of Ukraine can end the war with Russia almost immediately, if he wants to, or he can continue to fight,” Trump wrote. “Remember how it started. No getting back Obama given Crimea (12 years ago, without a shot being fired!), and NO GOING INTO NATO BY UKRAINE. Some things never change!!!”

Trump’s slew of pointed posts aimed at his opponents didn’t stop there.

Just hours before he was scheduled to host Zelenskyy at the White House, Trump railed against “badly failing Radical Left Democrats.”

“I am totally convinced that if Russia raised their hands and said, ‘We give up, we concede, we surrender, we will GIVE Ukraine and the great United States of America, the most revered, respected, and powerful of all countries, EVER, Moscow and St. Petersburg, and everything surrounding them for a thousand miles, the Fake News Media and their Democrat Partners would say that this was a bad and humiliating day for Donald J. Trump, one of the worst days in the history of our Country,’” Trump wrote in a Monday Truth Social post.

He added: “But that’s why they are the FAKE NEWS, and the badly failing Radical Left Democrats. Thank you for your attention to this matter!!!”

Minutes later, Trump claimed in a post that the “Russia/Ukraine MESS” is “Sleepy Joe Biden’s war, not mine,” adding, “ I’m only here to stop it, not to prosecute it any further. It would have NEVER happened if I was President.”

Elsewhere in the post, Trump claimed that The Wall Street Journal and “many other” news outlets “don’t have a clue” about the number of conflicts he’s resolved since his second term began.

“I’ve settled 6 Wars in 6 months, one of them a possible Nuclear disaster, and yet I have to read & listen to the Wall Street Journal, and many other who truly don’t have a clue, tell me everything that I am doing wrong…”

Trump’s meeting with Zelenskyy in the Oval Office on Monday marks the Ukrainian leader’s first White House visit since the two had a highly contentious meeting in February.

Meanwhile, Zelenskyy praised Trump’s strength in a post on X, formerly Twitter, on Monday morning ahead of their meeting.

“We discussed the battlefield situation and our strong diplomatic capabilities – Ukraine’s and all of Europe’s together with America,” he wrote. “Russia can only be forced into peace through strength, and President Trump has that strength. We have to do everything right to make peace happen. Thank you!”

President Donald Trump hinted he would demand that Ukraine give up territory seized by Russian dictator Vladimir Putin during his three-year invasion and once again blamed Volodymyr Zelenskyy for getting invaded.

“I get along with Zelenskyy, but, you know, I disagree with what he’s done, very, very severely disagree. This is a war that should have never happened,” Trump said at a White House press conference of Ukraine’s president, Volodymyr Zelenskyy, and his recent statement that he cannot legally cede territory.

“I was a little bothered by the fact that Zelenskyy was saying, ‘Well, I have to get constitutional approval,’” Trump said. “I mean, he’s got approval to go into war and kill everybody, but he needs approval to do a land swap because there will be some land-swapping going on.”

Trump announced last week he would host a meeting with Putin in Alaska to broker a peace agreement, and his comments to reporters Monday are the most detailed about his view of what needs to happen to persuade Putin to end the war.

His insinuation that Zelenskyy was somehow to blame for Putin’s invasion was a repeat of his attacks on the Ukrainian president during his Oval Office visit in February.

“What you’re doing is very disrespectful to the country, this country,” Trump told Zelenskyy then. “You’re not winning this. You have a damn good chance of coming out OK because of us.”

Six weeks later, Trump outright blamed Zelenskyy for starting the war. “You don’t start a war with someone 20 times your size and then hope people give you some missiles,” he said in an Oval Office photo opportunity with Salvadoran president Nayib Bukele.

Trump called the coming summit a “feel-out meeting” and that he would afterward call Zelenskky and America’s NATO allies in Europe, who have since the 2022 invasion been eager to counter Russia and help Ukraine and even more so since Trump returned to office in January.

He added that his discussions with Russia and others led to his belief that Ukraine would have to give away land to end the war. “I know that through Russia and through conversations with everybody,” Trump said.

Trump’s special envoy, his friend from New York real estate days Steve Witkoff, met with Putin last week and apparently misunderstood what Putin was saying. Witkoff reported back that Putin was willing to give up two Ukrainian regions and keep a third, when in fact Putin’s offer was to hang on to all three in return for stopping his attacks.

Trump on Monday also repeated his lie that the US under former President Joe Biden had given far more help to Ukraine than had Western Europe. “Biden approved $350 billion. Europe has spent $100 billion,” he said.

In reality, Europe has provided more assistance to Ukraine from the start, both in weapons and economic help.

Trump is scheduled to go to Alaska on Friday for his meeting with Putin, his first such summit with him since 2018, when in Helsinki he said he took the word of the former KGB agent over his own intelligence agencies about Russia’s work to help Trump win the 2016 election.

On Monday, though, Trump, who is 79, twice conflated Alaska with Russia itself. Alaska has belonged to the United States since 1867, when it was purchased from Russia, then under the rule of Czar Alexander II.

“I’m going to Russia on Friday,” Trump said, explaining his coming trip. An hour later, preparing to leave the podium, he said it again: “We’re going to Russia.”