Donald Trump already branded Volodymyr Zelenskyy a dictator for dodging elections.
Monday morning, Zelenskyy went on Fox News and gave Trump the same runaround.
What he told Bill Hemmer proves he still is not listening to the man bankrolling his war.
Zelenskyy Stalls On Elections Months After Trump's Warning
Back in February 2025, Trump had already seen enough.
He called Zelenskyy a "dictator without elections."
He said Ukraine would lose its country if its president kept stalling democracy to stay in power.
Eight months later, nothing has changed.
Hemmer asked Zelenskyy point blank on "America's Newsroom" whether he would commit to a real vote.
Zelenskyy did not say no.
He also did not say yes.
"If President Trump wants to change the leader in Ukraine, he has to know that only our people can change," Zelenskyy said.
That is not an answer. That is a stall.
He claimed he needs 60 days of total security before any ballot can be cast.
Convenient, since Zelenskyy is the one who gets to decide when Ukraine is secure enough to vote him out.
Trump has heard this excuse before. He is not buying it now either.
Zelenskyy Dodges Blame On Diesel Prices While Russia Keeps Bombing
Trump handed Zelenskyy a real win this weekend.
It was an announced energy ceasefire, meant to stop both sides from torching each other's power grids and refineries.
Zelenskyy's own government says Russia broke it within hours.
Fine. Putin lies. Everyone in Washington already knows that.
This is not even the first time. Back in April 2025, Ukraine's own foreign ministry accused Russia of violating a nearly identical Trump-brokered energy truce more than 30 times in under a month.
Putin treats ceasefires like press releases, not promises. He always has.
But Hemmer did not let Zelenskyy off easy either.
He pressed Zelenskyy on Ukraine's own refinery strikes, the ones Trump says are driving up fuel prices for American drivers.
Zelenskyy would not promise to stop.
"If Russia will not attack our energy, we will not attack the energy," he said.
Conditional. Reversible. Useless as a commitment.
Then Zelenskyy tried blaming someone else entirely for the diesel spike at your local pump.
"Everybody understands that it depends on the blocking of Hormuz Strait," Zelenskyy told Hemmer, pointing at Iran instead of his own drone strikes deep inside Russia.
Russia's foreign minister Sergey Lavrov was not interested in giving Zelenskyy cover either.
"I don't think he deserves a respite," Lavrov said Monday, rejecting the 60-day pause Zelenskyy wants for elections.
So now Zelenskyy is stuck.
A Russian foreign minister will not give him peace, and an American president will not give him a blank check anymore.
Trump Is the Only One Actually Trying to End This
Not every conservative voice is cheering Trump's diesel deal with Russia.
Carrie Filipetti, a former Trump State Department official now running the Vandenberg Coalition, warned that the arrangement "directly undermines recent US legislation calling for an increase in tariffs and sanctions against Russian energy."
Her point is fair. Handing Putin a new revenue stream while he is still bombing power plants is not nothing.
But Morgan Murphy, who ran public diplomacy for the Special Presidential Envoy to Russia and Ukraine, sees the bigger picture.
"President Trump has consistently prodded both sides toward the only realistic outcome, negotiation," Murphy said.
He is right. Neither army is actually winning this war, no matter what either side's propaganda says.
Putin keeps bombing because that is what Putin does. Nobody serious expected different.
Zelenskyy is the one who should know better.
He went on American television, in front of Trump's own base, and could not bring himself to give a straight answer on elections.
He could not commit to stopping strikes that are costing American families at the gas pump either.
Two chances to give Trump a clean answer. Two dodges.
That is exactly why Trump is right to keep squeezing both sides instead of trusting either man's word.
A deal that forces Putin to actually deliver diesel to American markets is real leverage.
Daring Zelenskyy to either hold a real election or stop blaming Iran for his own war decisions is real leverage too.
Soft words never worked on either man.
Trump's leverage might.
Sources:
- Efrat Lachter, "Zelenskyy accuses Putin of defying Trump's ceasefire push, sends pointed message to White House," Fox News, October 12, 2026.
- Fox8, "Trump calls Zelenskyy a 'dictator' as tensions rise between the leaders over the Russia-Ukraine war," Fox8 (Fox News affiliate), February 19, 2025.
- Carrie Filipetti, quoted in Efrat Lachter, "Zelenskyy accuses Putin of defying Trump's ceasefire push," Fox News Digital, October 12, 2026.
- Morgan Murphy, quoted in Efrat Lachter, "Zelenskyy accuses Putin of defying Trump's ceasefire push," Fox News Digital, October 12, 2026.
- Ukraine's Ministry of Foreign Affairs, cited in "Russia has violated 'energy ceasefire' more than 30 times, Ukraine says," Yahoo News, April 16, 2025.
