NYT Report: Witkoff, Kushner Discussed Multibillion-Dollar Lukoil Deal During Sept. 5 Kremlin Meeting

Since Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner traveled to Moscow and Kyiv in September to restart trilateral peace talks, the diplomacy has picked up a financial subplot. The New York Times reports that during a Sept. 5 meeting at the Kremlin, Vladimir Putin raised a multibillion-dollar deal for Lukoil, one of Russia's largest energy companies, to acquire oil fields, refineries and gas stations around the world.

Eight people familiar with the talks described the proposal to the Times. Kyiv Post reports the assets on the table include oil extraction concessions in Cameroon and Iraq, refining complexes in Bulgaria and Romania, and retail fuel networks across Europe and the U.S., including gas stations in New Jersey.

The buyer group includes American investor Todd Boehly, who has donated $2 million to Trump-aligned political causes, according to the Times. It also includes two Middle Eastern investment groups that have previously done business with Kushner or Witkoff's family, plus what Kyiv Post and Pravda describe as an entity affiliated with the U.S. government.

According to Pravda, citing the Times, one investor in the deal is also a co-owner of World Liberty Financial, the crypto venture co-founded by Zach Witkoff, Steve Witkoff's son. That overlap adds another data point to the web of business ties surrounding the negotiators, though no source establishes that Steve Witkoff or Kushner hold a stake in the Lukoil transaction itself.

What Putin reportedly wanted

One person briefed on the meeting told the Times that Putin pitched the deal as a way to show ordinary Russians that normal commerce with the United States remains possible. The Americans reportedly said they would work on it, viewing it as a way to build goodwill with the Kremlin while pushing down global oil prices.

The deal requires sign-off from both the U.S. government and the Kremlin. For the buyers, that approval carries a built-in financial windfall: lifting U.S. sanctions on Lukoil's assets would immediately raise their market value, the Times reported.

Lukoil operates as a nominally private, publicly traded company. But Kyiv Post reports that decisions on its major divestments are widely understood in Moscow to rest with Putin himself.

The administration's defense

A senior administration official told the Times that Kushner and Witkoff are helping negotiate the financial terms of the deal to secure, in the official's words, "a substantial upfront payment and profits for the United States." That's the strongest case the White House has offered: that the arrangement is structured to benefit American taxpayers and consumers, not just the private buyers.

No evidence has emerged that Witkoff or Kushner would personally profit from the transaction. A deal involving associates and former business partners is not the same as a deal that puts money directly in a negotiator's pocket.

The legitimate concern

The arrangement raises an obvious question that critics across the political spectrum would recognize as fair: should the two Americans brokering the terms of a war-ending peace deal also be the ones with personal and professional ties to the investors standing to benefit from it? The appearance of overlapping interests between diplomacy and private business is the kind of thing government ethics watchdogs flag regardless of which administration is in office.

Neither the White House, the Treasury Department, nor Lukoil responded to requests for comment outside normal business hours, according to The Moscow Times. No sanctions waiver has been issued. No deal has been finalized. No investigation or formal ethics review has been announced by any oversight body as of this reporting.

What's unresolved

The Epoch Times reported in mid-September that Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy's chief of staff expects trilateral talks involving Washington, Moscow and Kyiv to resume this month, potentially hosted by Turkey, the UAE or Switzerland. Zelenskyy has said the September meeting with Witkoff and Kushner covered security guarantees but largely avoided Ukraine's territorial disputes in the eastern Donbas region, which he said can only be settled leader-to-leader.

Whether the Lukoil transaction becomes a formal part of any peace settlement, or whether Treasury moves to lift sanctions on the assets, remains unresolved. Also unclear is whether Congress or federal ethics officials will seek more detail on how Boehly's group and the Middle Eastern investors were selected, and what role, if any, Witkoff and Kushner played beyond negotiating terms on the U.S. government's behalf.