Why it matters: Putin has shown no interest in sitting down with Zelensky through 3.5 years of war. President Trump claims that's now changed, and that a presidential meeting is the key to unlocking peace.

The Kremlin hasn't ruled out summits but has said they could only meet in the very final stages of clinching a peace agreement.

"The Federalist" CEO Sean Davis appeared on FNC's "The Will Cain Show" on Monday and reacted to Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky's meeting with President Donald Trump at the White House. WILL CAIN,

Doing so would require the Russian leader to “accept the failure of sitting down with a president he considers a joke from a country that doesn’t exist”

DONALD Trump said it is virtually impossible to set up a meeting between Putin and Zelensky as his efforts continue to be frustrated. Zelensky has said he is ready and willing to meet – but

A summit in Paris six years ago was the first and only time the two presidents ever met, flanked by French president Emmanuel Macron and Germany’s then-chancellor Angela Merkel. At the time, Putin and Zelensky were looking to hash out a ceasefire deal for war in Donbas in Ukraine’s east, where Russia-backed forces were fighting Ukrainian troops.

President Volodymyr Zelenskiy said on Thursday that large-scale Russian attacks overnight in various parts of Ukraine showed Moscow was avoiding negotiations about ending the more than three-year-old war.