Four Years In. Still No Deal.

Four years. That's how long the Russia-Ukraine war has been running — the same war Donald Trump repeatedly swore he could end in a single day.

It's still going. And according to USA Today, as of the February 24th anniversary of Russia's invasion, there was still no peace deal in sight.

So what happened?

The Negotiator Who Only Visits One Side

Steve Witkoff is Trump's chief Russia-Ukraine negotiator. Since March 2025, he has traveled to Moscow eight times, according to Brookings Institution Senior Fellow Steven Pifer.

His trips to Kyiv: zero.

The man supposedly brokering a neutral peace deal between two countries has spent over a year exclusively visiting the aggressor's capital. If a lawyer only met with one side in a lawsuit, we'd call that a conflict of interest. In diplomacy, this is being called strategy.

The Alaska Meeting Nobody's Talking About

In August 2025, Trump and Putin held a three-hour meeting in Anchorage, Alaska. Witkoff and Secretary of State Marco Rubio were there. So were Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov and Putin's longtime foreign policy advisor Yuri Ushakov.

Russian officials have since started referring to something called the "Anchorage understanding" — suggesting the two presidents reached some kind of framework for ending the war.

Putin, in remarks afterward, said the understanding would "open the road to peace in Ukraine." Trump responded positively but said it wasn't quite a done deal yet.

Neither leader gave specifics. Neither took questions.

Then Trump told Sean Hannity: "It's really up to President Zelenskyy to get it done."

According to Brookings, Trump reportedly told European leaders shortly after the Alaska summit that he supported Kyiv ceding all of the Donbas — territory Russia has NOT fully conquered by force. Trump may have pre-conceded land Ukraine still controls.

Putin Is Buying Time

Radoslaw Fogiel, vice chair of Poland's parliamentary foreign affairs committee, told USA Today directly: Russia is using negotiations to avoid any final U.S. pressure while grinding out incremental territorial gains in eastern Ukraine.

U.S.-mediated talks in Geneva on February 18th, 2026, ended after two hours.

Uriel Epshtein, CEO of the Renew Democracy Initiative, put it plainly to USA Today: "Putin is an incredibly talented KGB officer. He is incredibly effective at manipulating people and getting them to do what he wants."

Meanwhile, Russian missiles and drones keep hitting Ukrainian cities. Heat, water, and power have been cut to thousands of civilians — while Witkoff sits in Moscow discussing framework agreements.

Trump's Double Standard Is Real and Documented

Trump authorized U.S. forces to capture Venezuelan leader Nicolás Maduro. He bombed Iranian nuclear sites in June 2025. He threatens new action against Tehran. These are strong-handed moves against adversaries.

With Putin — a man who launched an unprovoked invasion of a sovereign country, whose forces have committed documented war crimes, who is actively shelling civilian infrastructure — Trump's posture has been consistently accommodating.

The hardest line Trump has drawn has been aimed at Ukraine, the victim. "Ukraine better come to the table fast," Trump told reporters on February 17th, 2026. That's a warning directed at the country being bombed, not the country doing the bombing.

What Mainstream Coverage Is Getting Wrong

Fox News framed the Florida talks between Trump and Zelenskyy as progress — "close but thorny issues remain." That's optimistic spin on what Brookings and USA Today both describe as a fundamentally broken process.

Left-leaning outlets, meanwhile, use this story mainly to hammer Trump politically rather than dig into the specific mechanics: What exactly was agreed to in Alaska? Why has Witkoff never gone to Kyiv? What specific territory is the U.S. pressuring Ukraine to surrender?

Neither side is asking those hard questions with the specificity the situation demands.

What This Means for Regular Americans

The U.S. has poured billions into Ukraine. American credibility is on the line. If Trump brokers a deal that effectively rewards Russia's land grab — territory seized through military force — that sets a precedent every adversary on Earth is watching.

China is paying close attention to Taiwan. Iran is watching. Every country with territorial ambitions is taking notes.

A bad peace deal isn't peace. It's a blueprint for the next war.

Trump can still get this right. But eight trips to Moscow and zero to Kyiv isn't negotiating. That's surrendering the table before the cards are dealt.