On September 25, 2019, U.S. President

Donald Trump Donald John Trump (born June 14, 1946) is an American politician, media personality, and businessman who is the 47th president of the United States. A member of the Republican Party (United States), Republican Party, he served as the 45 ...

and Ukrainian President

Volodymyr Zelenskyy Volodymyr Oleksandrovych Zelenskyy (born 25 January 1978) is a Ukrainian politician and former entertainer who has served as the sixth and current president of Ukraine since 2019. He took office five years after the start of the Russo-Ukraini ...

had a telephone call wherein they discussed a proposed ceasefire for the

Russo-Ukrainian War The Russo-Ukrainian War began in February 2014 and is ongoing. Following Ukraine's Revolution of Dignity, Russia Russian occupation of Crimea, occupied and Annexation of Crimea by the Russian Federation, annexed Crimea from Ukraine. It then ...

. The ceasefire, brokered between Russian president

Vladimir Putin Vladimir Vladimirovich Putin (born 7 October 1952) is a Russian politician and former intelligence officer who has served as President of Russia since 2012, having previously served from 2000 to 2008. Putin also served as Prime Minister of Ru ...

and Zelenskyy, was put together by French president

Emmanuel Macron Emmanuel Jean-Michel Frédéric Macron (; born 21 December 1977) is a French politician who has served as President of France and Co-Prince of Andorra since 2017. He was Ministry of Economy and Finance (France), Minister of Economics, Industr ...

and German Chancellor

Angela Merkel Angela Dorothea Merkel (; ; born 17 July 1954) is a German retired politician who served as Chancellor of Germany from 2005 to 2021. She is the only woman to have held the office. She was Leader of the Opposition from 2002 to 2005 and Leade ...

. The call became notable for multiple reasons: * The public information from the White House's record of the monitored call from the U.S.'s perspective mentioned Zelenskyy's criticism of Macron and Merkel. * It also became the premise for the

2019 Trump–Ukraine scandal The Trump–Ukraine scandal was a political scandal that arose primarily from the discovery of U.S. president Donald Trump's attempts to coerce Ukraine into investigating his political rival Joe Biden and thus potentially damage Joe Biden ...

, which in turn led to the

first impeachment of Donald Trump Donald Trump, serving as the 45th president of the United States, was impeached for the first time on December 18, 2019. On that date, the House of Representatives adopted two articles of impeachment against Trump: abuse of power and obstru ...

. * It was mentioned by Zelenskyy during the

2025 Trump–Zelenskyy Oval Office meeting On February 28, 2025, Donald Trump, the president of the United States, JD Vance, the vice president of the United States, and Volodymyr Zelenskyy, the president of Ukraine, held a highly contentious bilateral meeting televised live in the ...

Background

In 2014, Russia had annexed the Crimea region of

Ukraine Ukraine is a country in Eastern Europe. It is the List of European countries by area, second-largest country in Europe after Russia, which Russia–Ukraine border, borders it to the east and northeast. Ukraine also borders Belarus to the nor ...

and had backed pro-Russian separatists fighting in the eastern region of the country. On December 10, 2019, a ceasefire agreement was signed Zelenskyy, Putin, Macron and Merkel.

Controversy

On July 25, 2019, Zelenskyy had a telephone conversation about ceasefire agreement to U.S. President Trump. Trump mentioned criticism of Germany and Europe. To this, Zelenskyy replied:

Yes, you are absolutely right. Not only 100%, but actually 1000% and I can tell you the following; I did talk to Angela Merkel and I did meet with her I also met and talked with Macron, and I told them that they are not doing quite as much as they need to be doing on the issues with the sanctions. They are not enforcing the sanctions. They are not working as much as they should work for Ukraine.

The transcript was later declassified by Trump on September 25, 2019. This part of the conversation is mentioned by Zelenskyy in the 2025 Trump-Zelenskyy meeting for a proposed 2025 ceasefire between Russia and Ukraine, for the expanded military conflict due to the

Russia's invasion of Ukraine On 24 February 2022, , starting the largest and deadliest war in Europe since World War II, in a major escalation of the Russo-Ukrainian War, conflict between the two countries which began in 2014. The fighting has caused hundreds of thou ...

that had continued since 2022. For President Trump and the

U.S. Congress The United States Congress is the legislative branch of the federal government of the United States. It is a bicameral legislature, including a lower body, the U.S. House of Representatives, and an upper body, the U.S. Senate. They both ...

, the latter part of the same conversation became part of the foundations of the first impeachment of Donald Trump. The following statement was in the declassified transcript of this conversation. Zelenskyy had stated:

We are ready to continue to cooperate for the next steps specifically we are almost. Ready to buy more
Javelins A javelin is a light spear designed primarily to be thrown, historically as a ranged weapon. Today, the javelin is predominantly used for sporting purposes such as the javelin throw. The javelin is nearly always thrown by hand, unlike the slin ...
from the United States for defense purposes.

To which President Trump replied:

I would like you to do us a favor though because our country has been through a lot and Ukraine knows a lot about it. I would like you to find out what happened with this whole situation with Ukraine, they say
Crowdstrike CrowdStrike Holdings, Inc. is an American cybersecurity technology company based in Austin, Texas. It provides endpoint security, threat intelligence, and cyberattack response services. The company has been involved in investigations of seve ...
... I guess you have one of your wealthy people... The server, they say Ukraine has it. There are a lot of things that went on, the whole situation.

It was later reported that there was a

conspiracy theory A conspiracy theory is an explanation for an event or situation that asserts the existence of a conspiracy (generally by powerful sinister groups, often political in motivation), when other explanations are more probable.Additional sources: * ...

claiming that the prior Ukrainian government had used the cybersecurity company Crowdstrike to hack the Democratic Party computers in 2016 and blame Russia. The call transcript was reconstructed from the original call by means of notes and voice recognition software. There were ellipses of the White House transcript due to what could be words that had trailed off or were inaudible. However, a White House official would later state in testimony to impeachment investigators that some words and phrases were deliberately left out. According to testimony, what was deliberately removed was the following: * Trump asking about the existence of recordings of former Vice President Joseph R. Biden Jr. (the political opponent to Trump at that time). * Zelensky mentioning Burisma Holdings, a Ukrainian energy company that had employed Biden's son

Hunter Hunting is the human practice of seeking, pursuing, capturing, and killing wildlife or feral animals. The most common reasons for humans to hunt are to obtain the animal's body for meat and useful animal products ( fur/ hide, bone/tusks, ...

as a board member of the corporation. The first impeachment of Donald Trump was initiated due to the appearance of withholding military aid as a means of pressuring Zelensky to pursue investigations of Joe Biden and his son Hunter.

Notes

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:2019 Trump-Zelenskyy call 2019 controversies in the United States 2019 controversies 2019 in international relations Diplomatic incidents First Trump administration controversies Events affected by the Russian invasion of Ukraine