First Thing: Zelenskyy says he told Trump that Putin was ‘playing games’ with Washington

In an exclusive interview, Ukraine’s president says he believes the war will be won when Russian society feels its impact. Plus, why California’s election count is taking so long (hint: it’s not fraud) Don’t already get First Thing in your inbox? Sign up here In the fifth year of Russia’s full-scale war on Ukraine, Volodymr Zelenskyy says he is feeling upbeat and has been grateful for military support from the US, but has a pointed message for Washington. Speaking to Luke Harding and Pippa Crerar in London, the Ukrainian president acknowledged that the priority of Trump’s second term in foreign policy had shifted away from Ukraine to conflict in the Middle East. What did Zelenskyy say about Trump’s relationship with Putin? He carefully praised US diplomatic efforts, despite his bruising encounter in the Oval Office and the fact that Trump has been willing to meet Vladimir Putin, saying: “I always said to President Trump that Putin is lying. He plays games with you, with the White House.” Does he see any prospect of the war ending? The military situation was the most promising it had been for Kyiv for two and a half years, Zelenskyy ssaid. “We can’t say Russia is losing this war. But we can say they are losing the initiative each day, day by day,” he added. “Victory in this war is when Russian society recognises that the war is awful, that the war is a tragedy not for someone, somewhere, but for themselves.” To that end, Zelenskyy said the purpose of long-range strikes – drones buzzing above apartment blocks in greater Moscow and St Petersburg – was to make residents “feel” what war meant. Which other AI companies are making market moves? In addition to Anthropic, which makes the popular Claude chatbot, Elon Musk’s SpaceX, which owns his artificial intelligence company xAI, is also imminently slated to go public at an expected valuation of $1.75tn. Continue reading...