The stakes of a potential Trump-Putin summit: From the Politics Desk

Welcome to the online version of Political officeAn evening newsletter that brings you the latest report and analysis of the NBC News Policy team from the White House, Capitol Hill and the campaign campaign.

Happy Friday! In today’s edition, we are rummaging in a temporarily scheduled summit next week between President Donald Trump and Russian leader Vladimir Putin. In addition, Kristen Welker predicts her interview this weekend with Illinois Governor JB Pritzker. And Aria Bendix answers the question of this week’s reader on the last movements of the Trump administration vaccine.

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– Adam Wollner

Trump seems to give Putin a diplomatic victory with a temporarily planned summit

By Alexander Smith

Just when Ukraine and its European allies thought that President Donald Trump came from their point of view, he seemed to give a huge victory to his Russian counterpart, Vladimir Putin.

For kyiv, it was Trump’s deadline in Putin: stop fighting by Friday or face new difficult economic sanctions. Instead, Trump gave Moscow a diplomatic coup by agreeing to meet Putin face to face in a few days, their first meeting since the invasion of Ukraine.

Trump had initially suggested that such a summit would only go ahead if Putin agreed to meet Volodymyr Zelenskyy, which the administration of the Ukrainian president has long asked but was resisted by Russia. Trump dissipated the idea that they should meet – raising the spectrum of a bilateral negotiation that freezes kyiv on Thursday.

The last: Gabe Gutierrez and Monica Alba report that the meeting between Trump and Putin is temporarily scheduled for the end of next week. The location is still under discussion, said a senior White House official, but the possibilities include the United Arab Emirates, Hungary, Switzerland and Rome.

More details and the logistics of Reunion are not yet clear and remain very fluid, especially if Zelenskyy will be involved.

The issues: “The danger for Ukraine is actually quite serious,” said Jonathan Eyal, international director of the Royal United Services Institute, a London -based reflection group. “There will be a feeling of alarm in European capitals.”

For Eyal and others, Ukraine’s nightmare is now one more step from reality: “Trump will be so satisfied with what he perceives as the great achievement of bringing Putin to the negotiation table that he grabs all kinds of offer that is made,” said Eyal. “The danger of a half -cooked compromise, which Trump can claim as his main achievement, is very high.”

This compromise could be a temporary cease-fire that would allow Russia to restore its army and give its economy to its economy of international sanctions, according to Hope for Ukraine, a non-profit organization based in Roseland, New Jersey.

Even if there is no truce agreement, “a meeting with Trump – whatever the result – would be a great diplomatic victory for Putin,” said Yuriy Boyechko, Hope for Ukraine. “Putin wants to break his diplomatic isolation”, and such a meeting “will caress his ego”.

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The training effects of the growing redistribution wave

Kristen Welker analysis

The redistribution fight has passed.

The Governor of Texas, Greg Abbott, promised Thursday in an interview with NBC News to call “special session after special session after special session” until the state republicans can transmit new cards to win the majority of the party in the Congress, while the Republicans increase their legal threats against the Democrats who fled the state to block their progress.

Democrats promising to grow back. Governors like the Illinois JB Pritzker, Gavin Newsom from California and Kathy Hochul from New York warn that they could move forward on efforts to redesign the districts of their own states to stimulate Democrats if Texas walks new lines of the Congress.

This thrust of national democrats to go “nuclear” puts them online with the fight that their voters said that they wanted to see their leaders, at a time when the survey after survey shows the party to its lowest brands with the American public for decades.

But it is a risky bet – potentially more for Democrats than Republicans.

Democrats face an important crisis to obtain a special election on the ballot this fall which could allow them to redraw cards in California. The difficult speech of Hochul in New York is reprimanded by the laws there, which require a long legislative process which would probably not lead to new cards before the elections of 2028. And the Pritzker float of a redrawing up of Illinois is limited to more practical concerns-can Democrats withdraw more juice from a Congress card which has 14 Democrats and three Republicans?

And if all these efforts are successful, creating a new world where America constantly redesigns its congress districts for a short -term political gain, it will be the last nail in the coffin of species already threatened with moderate politicians on Capitol Hill?

We will discuss this question and many others in “Meet the Press” on Sunday, which includes exclusive interviews with Pritzker, the former attorney general Eric Holder and Senator Lindsey Graham, Rs.c.

✉️ Mailbag: the impact of the latest RFK vaccination policies

Thank you to everyone who sent us an email! The question of readers of this week concerns the recent movements of the Secretary of Health and Social Services Robert F. Kennedy Jr. on the financing of vaccines:

“Will there be enough covid vaccinations and influenza this fall?”

To answer this, we have turned to the health journalist Aria Bendix: we do not plan any major supply problem at the moment. Kennedy’s decision this week to reduce $ 500 million in mRNA vaccine contracts does not apply to current shooting. Rather, it reduces federal funds for research projects intended to develop new vaccines, such as vaccines or inhaled flu vaccines or shots that protect against bird flu. Arnm vaccines are considered a critical tool for the next pandemic, as they can be produced and updated quickly.

Regarding this fall and winter, the manufacturers of flu vaccines have already started to send doses to health care providers and pharmacies in anticipation of the flu season from October. And the FDA approved new formulations of the vaccine coded to deploy later this year.

However, there may still be a few obstacles to be vaccinated: it is not clear if insurers will cover the ceremonial vaccines for healthy children or pregnant people after Kennedy said that the CDC no longer recommended them for these groups. And the influenza vaccines containing the conservative Thimérosal – which constituted a very small part of the shots of last year – will not be available, according to a decision of a vaccine consulting committee appointed by Kennedy.

It’s all of the political bureau for the moment. Today’s newsletter was compiled by Adam Wollner and Dylan EBS.

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Correction (August 8, 2025, 5:07 pm HE): a previous version of this article has misused a comment on Putin’s diplomatic isolation. The statement was made by Yuriy Boyechko, not Gabriella Ramirez.