Secretary of State Marco Rubio struggled to explain why there had been "no ceasefire" between Russia and Ukraine after President Donald Trump's meeting with Russian President Vladimir Putin.
Fox News host Maria Bartiromo pressed Rubio on the outcome of the meeting in a Sunday morning interview.
"Why did President Trump's meeting with Putin end with no ceasefire?" Bartiromo asked as the interview began. "And what does Putin want?"
"Yeah, well, a couple things," Rubio replied. "First of all, if you recall, there's no way you can have a meeting like that. And we never said there was going to be a deal coming out of the meeting because the Ukrainians are not there."
"This is a war between two countries, not America; it's Ukraine and Russia," he continued. "We met with the Russian side. We've spoken repeatedly with the Ukrainian side. We'll see them again tomorrow in person, along with our allies in Europe. So I do think some progress was made in that talk."
Last week, however, Trump insisted that Putin would make a peace deal.
"I believe now he's convinced that he's going to make a deal," the U.S. president told Fox News host Brian Kilmeade on Thursday. "He's going to make a deal. I think he's going to. And we're going to find out — I'm going to know very quickly."
