Project 2025 architect Paul Dans to challenge Lindsey Graham
'Lindsey wouldn't be elected if I didn't endorse him,' Trump said.
One of the leading voices on Project 2025, Dans told the AP he expects to have the support of the project's allies as well as some of Trump's supporters.
Graham is seeking his fifth term as Republicans attempt to hold onto their 53-47 majority in the Senate during the 2026 midterms. Dans said it's 'time to show him the door.' Graham did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
Dans will officially announce his campaign at a Charleston event Wednesday.
Project 2025, the 900-page set of conservative policy proposals, dominated conversations during the 2024 presidential election. Though Trump insisted the plan — created by the conservative think tank The Heritage Foundation — was unrelated to his campaign, many of its architects, including Dans, have been involved with the Trump administration at some point or another.
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Yahoo
12 minutes ago
- Yahoo
Zelenskyy brings Europe's top leaders with him to meet Trump on ending Russia's war
WASHINGTON (AP) — Ukraine's future could hinge on a hastily assembled meeting Monday at the White House as Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy brings with him an extraordinary cadre of European leaders to show U.S. President Donald Trump a united front against Russia. The European political heavy-hitters were left out of Trump's summit with Russian President Vladimir Putin last Friday, and they look to safeguard Ukraine and the continent from any widening aggression from Moscow. By arriving as a group, they hope to avoid any debacles like Zelenskyy's February meeting in the Oval Office, where Trump chastised him for not showing enough gratitude for American military aid. The meeting also is a test of America's relationship with its closest allies after the European Union and United Kingdom accepted Trump's tariff hikes partly because they wanted his support on Ukraine. Monday's showing is a sign both of the progress and the possible distress coming out of the Alaska meeting as many of Europe's leaders are descending on Washington with the explicit goal of protecting Ukraine's interests, a rare and sweeping show of diplomatic force. 'It's important that America agrees to work with Europe to provide security guarantees for Ukraine, and therefore for all of Europe,' Zelenskyy said on X. The night before the meeting, however, Trump seemed to put the onus on Zelenskyy to agree to concessions and suggested that Ukraine could not regain Crimea, which Russia annexed in 2014, setting off an armed conflict that led to its broader 2022 invasion. "President Zelenskyy of Ukraine can end the war with Russia almost immediately, if he wants to, or he can continue to fight," he wrote Sunday night on social media. '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!!!' Zelenskyy appeared to respond with his own post late Sunday, saying, 'We all share a strong desire to end this war quickly and reliably.' He went on to say that 'peace must be lasting,' not as it was after Russia seized Crimea and part of the Donbas in eastern Ukraine eight years ago, and 'Putin simply used it as a springboard for a new attack.' The sitdown in Alaska yielded the possible contours for stopping the war in Ukraine, though it was unclear whether the terms discussed would ultimately be acceptable to Zelenskyy or Putin. The European heavyweights coming to Washington Planning to join Zelenskyy in America's capital are European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen, French President Emmanuel Macron, British Prime Minister Keir Starmer, German Chancellor Friedrich Merz, Italian Premier Giorgia Meloni, Finnish President Alexander Stubb and NATO Secretary-General Mark Rutte. On the table for discussion are possible NATO-like security guarantees that Ukraine would need for any peace with Russia to be durable. Putin opposes Ukraine joining NATO outright, yet Trump's team claims the Russian leader is open to allies agreeing to defend Ukraine if it comes under attack. Trump briefed Zelenskyy and European allies shortly after the Putin meeting, and details from the discussions emerged in a scattershot way that seemed to rankle the U.S. president, who had chosen not to outline any terms when appearing afterward with Putin. 'BIG PROGRESS ON RUSSIA,' Trump posted Sunday on social media. The president also bemoaned media coverage of his summit with Putin and said on Truth Social: "I had a great meeting in Alaska." Following the Alaska summit, Trump declared that a ceasefire was not necessary for peace talks to proceed, a sudden shift to a position favored by Putin. Secretary of State Marco Rubio said Sunday that a ceasefire was still possible but that 'the best way to end this conflict is through a full peace deal." The issues on the table for the European allies European officials confirmed that Trump told them Putin is still seeking control of the entire Donbas region, even though Ukraine controls a meaningful share of it. And Trump's special envoy, Steve Witkoff, said the U.S. and its allies could offer Ukraine a NATO-like commitment to defend the country if it came under attack as the possible security guarantee. "How that's constructed, what we call it, how it's built, what guarantees are built into it that are enforceable, that's what we'll be talking about over the next few days with our partners who are coming in from overseas,' Rubio told NBC's 'Meet the Press.' Rubio said on Fox News' 'Sunday Morning Futures' that such a commitment 'would be a very big move" by Trump. He expects the delegations will 'spend six, seven hours talking about these things, maybe more, and try to get to a point where we have something more concrete.' Monday's meeting will likely be very tough for Zelenskyy, an official close to the ongoing talks said. That official spoke on condition of anonymity to speak openly about thinking within Ukraine and between allies. Zelenskyy needs to prevent a scenario in which he gets blamed for blocking peace talks by rejecting Putin's maximalist demand on the Donbas, the official said. It is a demand Zelenskyy has said many times he will never accept because it is unconstitutional and could create a launching pad for future Russian attacks. If confronted with pressure to accept Putin's demands, Zelenskyy would likely have to revert to a skill he has demonstrated time and again: diplomatic tact. Ukrainian leadership is seeking a trilateral meeting with Zelenskyy, Trump and Putin to discuss sensitive matters, including territorial issues. Zelenskyy is looking to avoid another Oval Office blowup After enduring a public tirade by Trump and Vice President JD Vance in February, Zelenskyy worked to repair relations with the U.S. Constant diplomatic communication and a 15-minute meeting at the Vatican in April on the sidelines of Pope Francis' funeral helped turn the tide. Trump appeared at the time to be swayed by Zelenskyy's conditions for peace. But Trump says he cares primarily about ending the war, an ambition that led him after his meeting with Putin to discard the need for a ceasefire. European allies also have worked with Trump, reaching a deal in July for NATO allies to buy weapons from the U.S. for Ukraine. Ahead of Monday's meeting, France's Macron stressed the importance of building up Ukraine's military and the need to show Putin that Europe interprets his moves as a threat to other nations. 'If we are weak with Russia today, we'll be preparing the conflicts of tomorrow and they will impact the Ukrainians and — make no mistake — they can impact us, too,' Macron said. ___ Kullab reported from Kyiv, Ukraine. Associated Press writer John Leicester contributed from Le Pecq, France.
Boston Globe
13 minutes ago
- Boston Globe
Zelenskyy brings backup to the White House as Trump aligns more closely with Putin
By most accounts, the European officials want to ensure that Trump has not pivoted too close to the Russian side and does not try to strong-arm Zelenskyy into a deal that will ultimately sow the seeds of Ukraine's dissolution. And they want to safeguard against the risk of the United States, the linchpin of European security since NATO's creation in 1949, undermining that interest. In a call with Zelenskyy on Saturday, Trump offered support for U.S. security assurance for Ukraine after the war, a shift from his stance that Europe should bear the burden of protecting the country, though the specifics were unclear. Advertisement At a news conference Sunday in Brussels, Ursula von der Leyen, president of the European Union's executive arm, stressed the importance of security guarantees for Ukraine and respect for its territory. But she also said it was paramount to 'stop the killing' and urged talks among the presidents of Russia, Ukraine and the United States 'as soon as possible.' Advertisement One senior European diplomat, who spoke on the condition of anonymity out of fear of angering Trump, described a sense of panic among European allies. The diplomat had not seen a meeting like the one set for Monday come together so quickly since just before the Iraq War. The foremost concern, the diplomat said, was to avoid another scene like the one that took place in February when Zelenskyy met with Trump in front of the television cameras at the White House. At that meeting, Trump berated the Ukrainian president, saying 'you don't have the cards' in the war -- essentially telling a weak foreign power to bend to the demands of a far more powerful one. The president did so again Friday night, after Putin flew back to the Russian Far East, telling a Fox News interviewer that Ukraine was going to have to realize that Russia was a more 'powerful' country, and that power meant Zelenskyy was going to have to make concessions. On Sunday, Secretary of State Marco Rubio, who sat in on the meetings with Putin at the U.S. air base outside Anchorage, Alaska, disputed the idea that the Europeans were coming as a posse to protect Zelenskyy from a repeat of the February shouting match. 'They're not coming here to keep Zelenskyy from getting bullied,' Rubio insisted to Margaret Brennan on CBS' 'Face the Nation.' 'They are coming here tomorrow because we've been working with the Europeans,' he said, listing the many meetings the United States had engaged in before and after the Putin visit. 'We invited them to come.' European officials said Saturday that Trump told Zelenskyy he was free to bring guests to the meeting, and later the White House extended invitations to several European leaders. Advertisement Whatever the motive for the leaders to upend their schedules on short notice, there is little question that elements of the negotiation will test the cohesiveness of the Atlantic alliance. Putin's agenda is larger than just seizing part or all of Ukraine. For nearly a quarter-century, his grandest ambition has been to split NATO, dividing European allies from the United States. As Europe and Ukraine struggle to navigate Trump's sudden reversal of strategy for ending a war that has stretched well past three years, Putin has a renewed opportunity to realize his dream. The United States and its European allies now appear to be pursuing different negotiating strategies. The differences have been long brewing. But in the weeks before the Putin meeting, they broke out into the open. 'We're done with the funding of the Ukraine war business,' Vice President JD Vance said flatly a week ago. The Europeans, however, have promised continued support, through a grouping of countries operating outside of the NATO alliance. They got Trump to promise to supply weapons, as long as the United States was paid for them from European coffers. The message was clear: Defending Ukraine was Europe's problem, not Washington's. That was a wedge that Putin sought to exploit in Anchorage, and he did it skillfully. Trump has adopted many of Putin's talking points, and few of the West's. Even before he met face to face with Putin, he assured the Russian leader that Ukraine's application to join NATO would be put on long-term hold -- a position that his predecessor, Joe Biden, also took. At various moments, he hinted that Ukraine invited invasion by applying to the alliance and to membership in the European Union. Advertisement After the Friday summit with Putin, he went another step. Trump and European allies had agreed last week that a ceasefire must precede a peace accord, but he abandoned that view and sided with the Russian leader. 'With Trump abandoning the ceasefire, but making no reference to the 'severe consequences' he threatened, we are at a dangerous moment for the alliance,' said James G. Stavridis, a retired Navy admiral who served as NATO's supreme allied commander from 2009-13, when the United States still viewed Russia as a NATO partner, if a difficult one. This is exactly the kind of split that European leaders were trying to avoid after Trump's return to power in January. NATO's new secretary-general, Mark Rutte, a former prime minister of the Netherlands, visited Washington frequently for quiet meetings with Trump. He was determined to avoid the kind of public breach that took place in the first term, when Trump came to the edge of withdrawing the United States from what he called an 'obsolete' alliance. Rutte helped engineer the announcement in June, at a NATO summit, that nearly all members of the alliance had committed to spend 5% of their gross domestic product on defense. (Of that, 1.5% is infrastructure spending only tangentially related to military spending.) That gave Trump an early win -- and demonstrated that, even if a decade late, Europe was getting serious about taking responsibility for its own defense. Trump took credit, and left the summit praising NATO's reforms. Then European leaders designed the program to buy U.S. weapons for Ukraine, recognizing its appeal to the president. The United States could remain Ukraine's arms supplier, but at no cost to American taxpayers. Advertisement The strategy seemed to be paying off a few weeks ago, when Trump castigated Putin for holding friendly conversations while continuing to kill civilians. He set deadlines and threatened to impose secondary sanctions on countries that were buying oil from Russia. For the first time since Trump's inauguration, Washington's approach, including the threat of new sanctions on Russian oil and gas if there was no ceasefire, and Europe's continued military and economic pressure seemed roughly aligned. Last Wednesday, European leaders talked with Trump, and he agreed to hold firm with Putin that a ceasefire must precede a longer peace negotiation. That alignment is what blew up in Anchorage. 'It was determined by all that the best way to end the horrific war between Russia and Ukraine is to go directly to a Peace Agreement,' Trump wrote on his social media site early Saturday. Trump's flip-flops stand in contrast to Putin's determination to stay the course with the war, even as the body count of Russians killed has soared. 'Peace will come when we achieve our goals,' he proclaimed in late 2023. Even then, Putin privately was sending signals that he was open to discussing a ceasefire, but only if it froze existing battle lines -- meaning Ukraine would have to cede control over roughly 20% of its territory. His overtures were rebuffed at the time. But now the Russian military is making considerable gains, so Putin no longer has interest in a ceasefire. 'They feel like they've got momentum in the battlefield,' Rubio said, 'and frankly, don't care, don't seem to care very much about how many Russian soldiers die in this endeavor.' Advertisement 'It's a meat grinder,'' he added, 'and they just have more meat to grind.' That reality would seem to suggest that the timing is hardly right for a peace agreement. Putin may calculate his best strategy is to drag out the talks. But when European and U.S. officials gather at the White House on Monday, they will have more to discuss than just boundaries. The Europeans have to find a way to bring Trump on board for concrete security guarantees for Ukraine -- which could include a peacekeeping force that would deter Putin from restarting the war in a few years. In his conversation with European leaders after the Putin summit, Trump suggested for the first time that he might be willing to join that effort -- though the assumption is that he would contribute U.S. intelligence, not troops. In London on Sunday, after a virtual meeting of European countries that call themselves a 'coalition of the willing' -- a phrase used in the Iraq and Afghanistan wars -- British Prime Minister Keir Starmer issued a statement that commended Trump for his 'commitment to providing security guarantees for Ukraine.' That phrasing seemed intended to lock him into the effort. The statement reiterated that the United Kingdom and other European nations were ready to 'deploy a reassurance force once hostilities have ceased, and to help secure Ukraine's skies and seas and regenerate Ukraine's armed forces.' The United States has never been that specific. This article originally appeared in .
New York Times
14 minutes ago
- New York Times
Zelensky Calls for ‘Lasting' Peace, and Warns of Russia's Intentions
President Volodymyr Zelensky of Ukraine on Sunday called for a 'lasting' peace to end the war there, and warned that President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia had previously seized Ukrainian land as 'a springboard for a new attack.' Mr. Zelensky made the comments on social media after he arrived in Washington ahead of planned high-stakes meetings at the White House on Monday with President Trump and several European leaders. Mr. Trump met Mr. Putin in Alaska on Friday for talks on Ukraine that ended without the cease-fire Mr. Trump had been insisting was necessary to secure a peace deal. Instead, he backed Mr. Putin's plan for a sweeping peace agreement based on Ukraine ceding territory it controls to Russia. Russia already occupies almost a fifth of Ukraine, including the entire Crimean Peninsula and large portions of an eastern region known as the Donbas. Mr. Trump told European leaders after his Alaska meeting that a peace deal could be struck quickly if Mr. Zelensky agreed to give up the rest of the Donbas. In his comments on Sunday, Mr. Zelensky appeared to subtly push back against that idea — not directly, but by describing Russia's 2014 annexation of Crimea and invasion of eastern Ukraine as a cautionary tale. 'We all share a strong desire to end this war quickly and reliably,' he wrote. 'And peace must be lasting. Not like it was years ago, when Ukraine was forced to give up Crimea and part of our East — part of Donbas — and Putin simply used it as a springboard for a new attack.' Mr. Zelensky said the 'so called' security guarantees that Ukraine received from Russia, the United States and Britain under a 1994 accord — in exchange for giving old Soviet nuclear weapons back to Russia — also had not worked. 'Of course, Crimea should not have been given up then, just as Ukrainians did not give up Kyiv, Odesa, or Kharkiv after 2022,' he wrote, referring to Russia's full-scale invasion of Ukraine that year. Mr. Zelensky will meet Mr. Trump at the White House early Monday afternoon. Later in the day, they will be joined by the leaders of France, Germany, Britain and Italy, as well as the secretary general of NATO and the president of the European Union's executive arm. Mr. Trump's recent reversal on a critical negotiating point for Ukraine and Europe — obtaining a cease-fire before negotiating land or security guarantees — has left many European officials wondering whether Mr. Trump was swayed by Mr. Putin in Alaska.
