The Journal. - Why Trump Wants Ukrainian Minerals

Episode Date: February 24, 2025

The Trump administration is pushing Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky to hand over mineral rights worth hundreds of billions of dollars to the U.S. Zelensky said a deal is possible but he wants better terms. WSJ's James Marson explains why these minerals are so valuable and what this potential deal could mean for ending the war between Russia and Ukraine. Further Listening: - Trump 2.0: Shaking Up Europe  - Ukraine's $30 Billion Problem  Further Reading: - A Guide to U.S.-Russia Talks on Ending the War in Ukraine  - Ukraine’s Zelensky Wants Better Terms on Minerals Deal Demanded by Trump  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Earlier this month, U.S. Treasury Secretary Scott Besant flew to Ukraine. He was there to meet with the country's president, Volodymyr Zelensky. And there was something specific Besant wanted to talk with Zelensky about. And the account went like this. Besant pushed a piece of paper across the table, which was a deal. A deal for Ukraine to sign away to the U.S. rights to some of its mineral resources. That's our colleague James Marson, Ukraine bureau chief. The scene is based on a description from a U.S. Republican lawmaker who spoke with Zelensky

a few days later. He demanded that Zelensky sign it. Zelensky took a look and said he'd discuss it with his team. Besant then pushed it closer to Zelensky and said, you really need to sign this. He then said that people back in Washington would be upset if Zelensky didn't. Zelensky took the document and he didn't commit to signing it. The Trump administration was asking for the rights to hundreds of billions of dollars worth of Ukrainian mineral deposits.

It says the minerals would repay the U.S. for its military and financial aid to Ukraine during the war. And now, the mineral rights have become a major focus for the Trump administration as it pushes to end the war. What you see here is a microcosm of how Trump sees the world. We were giving this money to Ukraine for years, but Trump has come in and said, that's not how we're going to do things anymore. We need something back for that.

We need something concrete back for that. For example, access to Ukrainian minerals. Welcome to The Journal, our show about money, business, and power. I'm Ryan Knudson. It's Monday, February 24th. Coming up on the show, why the Trump administration wants Ukraine's minerals, and what it could mean for peace talks. Today is the three-year anniversary of Russia's invasion of Ukraine. Since the war began, Russia has killed tens of thousands of Ukrainian soldiers and civilians

and raised dozens of cities. Tens of thousands of Russian soldiers have also died. At the beginning of the war, the Biden administration didn't expect Ukraine to last long. It thought that the Russian army, very powerful big army, would quickly be able to seize Kiev and probably unseat the Ukrainian government and insert a puppet government. That didn't happen. The Ukrainian army, with the great help of civilians who took up arms, managed to stop the Russian army, prevent them taking Kiev, and preserve the independence, the sovereignty

of their country. During the Biden administration, the US sent billions of dollars in aid and military equipment, which helped Ukraine take back some territory and limit the gains of Russia's huge military. We cannot grow weary. We cannot look away. And we will not let up on our support for Ukraine. Trump's relationship with Ukraine has been more rocky. It was a phone call between Zelensky and Trump

that led to Trump's first impeachment back in 2019. During the 2024 presidential race, Trump campaigned on ending the war. Before I even arrive at the Oval Office, I will have the disastrous war between Russia and Ukraine settled. And he said he would do it fast. And it will take me no longer than one day. What we've seen since President Trump came to office is that the script has been flipped. We've seen an outreach to President Putin. Trump is engaging with Putin to try to reach

a peace deal. And with Zelensky, instead of the support, which we've seen before, he has criticized him very, very heavily, and he has demanded payback for the support that has been given so far, and clearly conditioned any future support on some kind of payback from the Ukrainian side. The way Trump has gone about trying to end the war is very different than the Biden administration. Mainly, Trump has been trying to do it by putting a lot more pressure on Ukraine. And about two weeks ago, things really ramped up. The first thing that happened was that Trump had a 90-minute phone call with Russian President Vladimir Putin, the first time a sitting US president spoke with Putin since the war. On the same day, Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth told allies that Ukraine shouldn't expect

to get all its territory back from Russia and that Ukraine should not be allowed to join NATO. We want, like you, a sovereign and prosperous Ukraine. But we must start by recognizing that returning to Ukraine's pre-2014 borders is an unrealistic objective. A few days later, the Trump administration met with Russian envoys in Saudi Arabia to discuss a peace deal. Ukraine and its European allies weren't included.

Zelensky denounced the talks and said he would not accept a peace deal if his country wasn't involved. After this, Trump escalated attacks on Zelensky in Ukraine, saying that the democratically elected Zelensky was a dictator, and that Ukraine, not Russia, started the war. A dictator without elections, Zelensky better move faster. He's not going to have a country left. You should have ended it three years. You should have never started it.

You could have made a deal. I could have a country left. Got to move. You should have ended it three years. You should have never started it. You could have made a deal. I could have made a deal. After this, things escalated quickly. President Trump said that Zelensky misused US aid, and he criticized him strongly for not signing this minerals deal, which he'd been presented with by Secretary Bassant a few days earlier. Let's talk about that minerals deal.

What are the minerals? Why are they valuable and why would President Trump want them? So Ukraine says it has Europe's largest reserves of titanium, which is used in manufacturing of aircraft and ships and lithium, which is used in manufacturing of aircraft and ships, and lithium, which is a key material in batteries. It's also got deposits of rare earths, which are used in high-tech industries, defense industries, renewable energy. So Ukraine has got significant reserves of these rare minerals, minerals that are critical to modern and future industries.

And that's why Trump is interested in them. Right now, China dominates the market for most of these minerals. And as Trump escalates his trade war with China, finding new sources has become more important. The idea to do a deal with the US over Ukraine's minerals was actually first brought up by Ukraine this past September before Trump was elected. So when it was clear that President Trump was going to be the Republican candidate in the presidential election, the Ukrainians were thinking of ways to make sure that the US maintained its support for Ukraine, knowing that Trump is a lover of making deals. They came up

with this idea of offering Ukraine's mineral wealth to President Trump and saying, look, we're grateful for the support that the US has given us. We want to make sure that the US is getting something back for that. And so we want to give the US, give US companies access to these minerals as kind of a security and economic deal that will be good for both sides. Ukraine's proposal didn't have specifics, and it's unclear how it evolved into Treasury Secretary Besant's offer. The thing is, many of these minerals haven't been mined yet, and an estimated 20 to 40% of them are in Russian occupied parts of Ukraine. And even though Ukraine initially brought up the idea, Zelensky was still surprised when Bessent pushed that piece of paper across the table. We spoke with an aide to Zelensky who said, this level of deal, a multi-billion dollar deal,

is the kind of thing that would be signed on the level of presidents. This is something that Zelensky would eventually sign with Trump. And I think that undoubtedly is one of Ukraine's goals. If you sign a big deal that would be a security and economic deal that Ukraine wants, then you would do it with President Trump.

So how did Zelensky respond to Besant's offer? So the Ukrainians have said all along, they are open to a deal. They're interested in a deal. They want to do a deal with the US. But they didn't like this initial proposal. They saw it as a demand for Ukrainian resources without the main thing that the Ukrainians are looking for, which is security guarantees. Zelensky said, this isn't a serious conversation. I can't sell our state. So he saw it as a demand that he sell the wealth of his nation

without what he needs most in return, which is security guarantees. What it might take for Ukraine to agree is after the break. Despite Ukraine's reservations about a minerals deal with the U.S., deal talks intensified over the past few days. Still, there's a ways to go. At a press conference on Sunday, Zelensky said his country still needed better terms in order to move forward. He repeated his earlier criticisms of what was on offer.

He said any deal had to include security guarantees for Ukraine and that Trump's demands for payback for military and financial aid provided during the war far outstrip the $100 billion that the U.S. had actually provided. Zelensky also said that the current U.S. offer demanded ruinous financial contributions, and said, quote, I don't want something that 10 generations of Ukrainians will have to pay back. US Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth also discussed the deal

on Fox on Sunday. Zelensky should come to the table, because this economic partnership is an important thing for the future of his country, and we hope that he will very soon. Russia has taken note of the minerals dispute and has started making references to it. Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov said recently

that the minerals were a reason Russia should not withdraw from occupied parts of Ukraine. My colleague Yaroslav Trofimov got hold of a document, some talking points that had been prepared by a Russian think tank for the Kremlin. And one of the talking points was the idea to tell the Americans, your companies will be welcome to develop rare mineral deposits in occupied Ukraine, if you make a deal with us.

In other words, the Ukrainians aren't the only ones who have something to offer Trump when it comes to minerals. The U.S. has been Trump when it comes to minerals. The U.S. has been such an important ally to Ukraine. So is it risky for Zelensky not to go along with this and to risk upsetting the Trump administration? I think the fact that Ukraine is not prepared to sign this deal speaks to a number of things. First of all, it would be giving away

some of your most important assets. This would be terrible domestically for Zelensky. Not only would it be in his telling a bad deal for his country, it would be terrible domestically for Zelensky. He and his country have stood firm for three years against Russia, against Russia's invasion. Now there's this demand. Russia demands that he gives up the country. Now there's this demand, you know, Russia demands that he gives up the country. Now Trump is demanding that he gives up an important asset of the country so he can't come across as weak and simply capitulating. James says a lot depends on what Trump wants from Ukraine. Does he want peace at

any cost? If he wants peace at any cost, he can make a deal with Putin. He can say to Putin, take Ukraine. Now in that case, Ukraine would continue fighting for sure. But people in his administration have said that the Trump administration wants Ukraine to preserve its independence, its sovereignty, that he's going to carry out tough negotiations with Putin. And so then at some point, you're going to get into tough negotiations about how Putin sees the future of Ukraine. So what is this signal about the way peace talks might unfold? So the peace talks that are happening at the moment are between the US and Russia.

Ukraine is not a part of them. Now, Trump has said that Ukraine will eventually take part in them. But you have the peace talks going on there with the US trying to get to a deal with Russia. But at the same time, you have the US negotiating with Ukraine to try to get the mineral deal. It seems like this is a reflection of how Trump views America's role in the world, which is to be transactional, to do deals with different countries that are in America's interest or not. That's right.

interest or not. That's right. Ukraine has been one of the success stories of US foreign policy, and that includes US aid policy over the last 20, 30 years. Ukraine gained its independence in 1991 from the Soviet Union, and slowly, gradually became more and more pro-Western. It fought for its independence. Its people have carried out two revolutions to maintain its right to choose its own president and to be independent of Russian influence. The U.S. has provided billions of dollars that has helped develop Ukraine's economy.

Now we have President Trump has come in with a different attitude. Trump says we should get something back in return. And so that is how the minerals can play into the peace talks. Because if Trump feels he isn't getting anything from this support for Ukraine, then that support, allies, Ukrainians worry, will no longer be there, which will strengthen Putin's hand on the battlefield and therefore in talks. On Monday, Ukrainian officials suggested that the deal is moving in a more positive direction. At a press conference, President Trump said a deal was very close. In what form is not yet clear.

That's all for today. Monday, February 24th. The Journal is a co-production of Spotify and The Wall Street Journal. Additional reporting in this episode by Alexander Ward, Alan Cullison, and Ian Lovett. Thanks for listening. See you tomorrow.