CNN —
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky’s visit to the White House on Thursday may be his final chance to convince a receptive U.S. president of his country’s war aims.
The exact details of the “victory plan” that Zelensky plans to present in separate meetings with President Joe Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris are being kept tightly under wraps and remain unclear until it is presented to US leaders.
But people briefed on the plan said it reflects a pressing need from Ukrainian leaders for faster help to counter Russian aggression. Zelenskiy also wants long-term security guarantees that can withstand a change in U.S. leadership ahead of a presidential election widely expected to be close between Harris and former President Donald Trump.
The plan, said the people, is Mr. Zelenskiy’s response to growing war fatigue even among his staunchest Western allies, and would underscore his argument that Ukraine can still win if enough aid is rushed in, and that it doesn’t need to cede territory captured by Russia to end the fighting.
That would include again seeking permission to fire long-range weapons provided by Western countries deeper into Russian territory — a line Biden was once reluctant to cross but has appeared more willing to take in recent days as pressure for concessions has grown.
Even if Biden decides to authorize long-range artillery fire, it is unclear whether the policy change would be publicly announced.
Biden would typically take his time deciding whether to provide Ukraine with new capabilities, but Ukrainian officials, and many U.S. officials, believe there is little time to waste in a November election that could significantly change the U.S. approach to the war if Trump wins.
Since taking office, President Trump has insisted he can “solve” the war and has signaled an end to U.S. support for Kiev’s war effort.
“These cities are gone. We continue to give billions of dollars to Zelenskyy because he refused to make a deal. Any deal he could have made would not have been better than what we have now. The country is devastated and it will never be rebuilt,” Trump said during a campaign speech in Mint Hill, North Carolina, on Wednesday.
Those comments lend new weight to Thursday’s Oval Office talks and underscore the need for Biden to ramp up aid to Ukraine while he’s still in office, U.S. and European officials said.
The US is expected to announce a major new security package as part of Zelenskiy’s visit, but shipments of equipment will likely be delayed due to inventory shortages, CNN previously reported, citing two US officials. The US announced the $375 million package on Wednesday.
The president had announced Zelensky’s visit to the White House the day before, and declared at the United Nations General Assembly that his administration was “determined to ensure that Ukraine has what it needs to win its fight for survival.”
“Tomorrow I will be announcing a series of measures to accelerate support for the Ukrainian Armed Forces, but we know that Ukraine’s future victory will depend not only on what happens on the battlefield, but also on whether Ukrainians make the most of the free and independent future for which so many have sacrificed,” he said.
Worries about the future of U.S. aid have clouded many of Zelenskiy’s visits to Washington, including one last year that was aimed in part at pressuring Republican congressional leaders to approve billions of dollars in new aid.
Though the aid was ultimately approved, support for Ukraine is not high among President Trump’s allies. Zelensky will visit the U.S. Capitol on Thursday but is not scheduled to meet with House Speaker Mike Johnson, a Republican.
“This war has chipped away at Russia’s basic vitality. If you look at the number of Russian casualties, if you look at the number of millions who have fled Russia, yes, the Russian war machine is running, but the economy is being hollowed out,” US National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan said on MSNBC this week. “So over time, whether it’s Putin or the people around him, I think they’re going to realize that there’s no point in continuing this war. And it’s incumbent on us to help hasten that day.”
Zelensky is scheduled to meet separately with Harris on Thursday, signalling his eagerness to further develop the most important relationship between the two leaders if she wins, after she finishes meeting with Biden.
In the weeks since taking over the political baton from Biden, Harris and her aides have done their best to assert that there is no difference between the vice president and the outgoing president when it comes to key foreign policy issues.
The ongoing war between Ukraine and Russia is no exception, they argue, and under a Harris presidency, Ukraine will continue to receive unwavering support against Russian aggression.
The vice president’s face-to-face meeting with Zelensky on Thursday will be their sixth meeting since the war broke out in February 2022. Just days before the Russian aggression began in February 2022, the vice president also met with Zelensky at the Munich Security Conference, where the two discussed Russia’s military buildup around Ukraine and the possibility of war breaking out.
In her speech at the Democratic National Convention last month, Harris deliberately claimed credit for the US response.
“Five days before Russia attacked Ukraine, I met with President Zelenskyy to warn him about Russia’s planned invasion. I helped rally a global response of more than 50 nations to defend against Putin’s aggression,” she said. “And as president, I will stand strong with Ukraine and our NATO allies.”
Advisers to the vice president say Trump’s public comments about the Ukraine war make it very clear that the vice president and the former president have very different worldviews on foreign policy. (Trump seems unlikely to meet with the Ukrainian leader, despite saying last week that he probably would.)
The Trump campaign has blasted Zelensky over a New Yorker interview published Sunday in which he called his running mate, J.D. Vance, “too extreme.”
“His message seems to be that Ukraine has to make sacrifices. This goes back to the question of cost and who will bear it. The idea that the world will end this war at the expense of Ukraine is unacceptable,” Zelensky said in the interview. “To us, this is a dangerous signal coming from a vice presidential candidate.”
Trump was referring to his remarks in North Carolina on Wednesday.
“The president of Ukraine is here in our country, and he is making spiteful smears against me, your favorite president,” he said.
There is also a quiet recognition within the Biden administration that whatever assurances Zelensky receives from Biden and Harris this week about US commitments to help Ukraine, it could all be for naught if the US president changes.
Speaking at a ceremony to sign a new US-Ukraine defense pact on the sidelines of the G7 summit in Italy in June, President Zelenskyy was asked what contingency plans the US had for just such a scenario.
“If the people are with us, then any leader will be with us in this struggle for freedom,” Zelenskyy replied.
