Laura Loomer Went From Calling Ukraine "Nazi Apologists" to Interviewing Zelenskyy in His Garden

Laura Loomer has spent years telling her nearly 2 million followers that Ukraine doesn't deserve American support. She called it a country "full of Nazi apologists," a talking point Russia has used to justify its 2022 invasion, and said Volodymyr Zelenskyy was a "Jihadi apologist." This week she stood in the garden of the presidential palace in Kyiv and interviewed him one-on-one.

The reversal happened fast. According to The Guardian, Loomer wrote on X after experiencing an air raid siren in Kyiv: "I often said I don't care. Looking back, that wasn't very nice of me to say. We need to have moral clarity." She's now calling for the U.S. to break Russia's economy "until they submit to peace," and tying Moscow to Iran, saying Russia is "funding Iran and providing them with explosives to murder US soldiers."

Loomer is not a government official. She's an activist and blogger with no title. But according to the Financial Times, she has more access to Trump than almost any outside activist, weighing in on both policy and personnel decisions. If Loomer flips on Ukraine, she could move opinion inside a MAGA base that has been skeptical of Kyiv from the start.

During her trip, Loomer met with Serhiy Kyslytsya, first deputy head of the Ukrainian presidential administration, who gave her a tour of the Kyiv-Pechersk Lavra, according to UA.news. She also visited a McDonald's location in Kyiv that Russian strikes have hit repeatedly, and posted photos in front of bombed-out buildings praising what she called Ukraine's "unwavering" resilience.

Loomer got ahead of the obvious question. "To those who are asking: no, the Ukrainian government did not pay for my trip to Ukraine," she wrote on X. No source in this reporting disputes that claim or offers evidence otherwise. It's an unresolved point worth watching if more details on trip funding surface later.

What Zelenskyy Told Her

In the interview, Zelenskyy addressed his blowup with Trump and Vice President JD Vance in the Oval Office last year, telling Loomer the relationship has "significantly improved" since then. He pointed to a brief conversation with Trump at the Vatican in April 2025 as a turning point. "We changed the relations during 15, 20 minutes," he said.

Zelenskyy also told Loomer he expects to meet Trump in Washington, likely tied to Senator Lindsey Graham's funeral, with a Russian sanctions bill moving through Congress at the same time. The White House has since confirmed the two leaders are scheduled to meet Tuesday, according to The Guardian.

Trump reacted to the interview himself, posting on Truth Social that it was "Very good!!!!!!" Commentators in Kyiv, per The Guardian, read that reaction as confirmation that the administration's posture toward Ukraine is shifting, timed to a period when Ukrainian long-range drones have been hitting targets deep inside Russia.

The Skeptic's Case, Stated Fairly

Before dismissing the years Loomer and others spent questioning Ukraine funding, it's worth stating that position honestly. Loomer wasn't alone. The Guardian notes her skepticism was shared by other prominent conservative voices, including Tucker Carlson. Their underlying argument was never purely pro-Kremlin talking points. It also included concerns about how tens of billions in U.S. aid dollars were tracked, whether Ukraine's government was sufficiently accountable for that spending, and whether America should be bankrolling a foreign war indefinitely without a clear endgame. Those are legitimate fiscal and strategic questions, and nothing in this reporting resolves them one way or the other.

What's changed is Loomer's framing of Zelenskyy's government itself, not necessarily the underlying fiscal questions. She's moved from calling Ukraine's leadership Nazi and jihad apologists to praising its resilience, and that specific rhetorical shift is what the FT and Guardian are covering.

Meanwhile the war hasn't paused for any of this. The Guardian reported a Russian daytime ballistic missile strike on the Kyiv region killed ten people and injured nearly 100 more, with a separate air bomb strike on Sloviansk killing five. Loomer's changed rhetoric doesn't change what's happening on the ground.

What Happens Next

The test isn't Loomer's tweets. It's whether her shift moves any votes on Capitol Hill or any opinion inside Trump's base ahead of the Trump-Zelenskyy meeting scheduled for Tuesday in Washington, and whether the Russian sanctions bill now moving through Congress picks up momentum. Neither outcome is guaranteed by one influencer's changed mind, however close she sits to the Oval Office.