Trump’s Planned Second Meeting with Putin in Budapest is Called Off

The much-anticipated second meeting between United States President Donald Trump and his Russian counterpart, Vladimir Putin, has been abruptly cancelled, a senior White House official confirmed on Tuesday. This decision reverses the expectation set by President Trump just last week for a rapid follow-up summit.

Dependable NG reports that the cancellation was prompted by a telephone conversation held on Monday between Secretary of State Marco Rubio and Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov. Following that call, the President’s office stated that an additional in-person meeting between the top diplomats “is not necessary, and there are no plans for President Trump to meet with President Putin in the immediate future.”

The proposed summit, which President Trump had announced on Truth Social last Thursday would take place “soon” in Budapest, Hungary, was intended to be preceded by preparatory sessions between officials from Washington and Moscow. This push for a second meeting came shortly after the two leaders held an initial conversation on October 16.

The State Department’s readout of the Rubio-Lavrov call indicated that the diplomats discussed the next steps following the presidential call, with Secretary Rubio reportedly emphasizing “the importance of upcoming engagements” as an opportunity to collaborate on advancing a durable resolution to the Russia–Ukraine war. However, it appears the preliminary diplomatic efforts did not yield the desired groundwork for a presidential meeting.

The development comes just days after President Trump hosted Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky at the White House. During their meeting, where the leaders discussed America’s increased support for Kyiv in the ongoing conflict, Zelensky pressed for long-range Tomahawk missiles to strengthen his country’s air defence. While President Trump expressed a desire for a peaceful resolution to the war, he simultaneously noted the U.S. interest in acquiring Ukrainian drones. The halt to the Budapest summit introduces fresh uncertainty into the high-stakes diplomatic effort to end the protracted war in Ukraine.