How is the Russian Media Reacting to the Trump-Putin Phone Call?

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FilterLabs has been closely following Russian coverage of US-Russo diplomacy in the Trump era, gathering and analyzing millions of online artifacts to detect deeper patterns under the daily churn. One pattern that caught our eye came in the aftermath of Trump and Putin’s February 12th phone call, the one where Trump pushed for a Kremlin-friendly peace agreement with Ukraine. 

Having tracked relatively closely to one another since the inauguration, sentiment towards Trump and sentiment towards the United States in Russian news media (which often echoes Kremlin propaganda) clearly diverged.

Our analysis with Talisman offers a few clues on the swings in post-phone-call Russian media sentiment around Trump. Starting with the rise:

• Peace…maybe? Headlines in Russia voiced cautious optimism about the potential for a peace deal on Ukraine. Articles highlighted Putin’s press secretary’s description of the call as “very constructive, businesslike and quite frank. In general, since the last term of President Trump, quite constructive relations have been built between them, which continue to this day.”

• Gloating at Zelensky’s expense. On social media and in the news, commentators gleefully predicted that a closer Trump-Putin relationship would mean disaster for the Ukrainian President. One headline read, “Trump put an end to Kiev's hopes: in a phone call with Putin, he clearly showed Zelensky his place”

• Thanks to Xi. The Russian media was quick to point out the role that China had played, indirectly, in strengthening Putin’s hand. In a Telegram post, Russian Sinologist Nikita Vavilov wrote, “Russia has achieved its goal—the negotiations will proceed as we want, and this victory did not happen without the help of China.”

For a few days, Feb 12 to 16, Russian media coverage gave Trump consistent praise and little to no criticism. 

Then around February 17th, doubts began to creep in. By the 19th, sentiment around Trump in Russian media discourse was dropping sharply. Why? Using Talisman, we found a couple notable shifts:

• Not such a good pal after all? On February 17, Trump announced that Europe will be allowed to buy weapons from the US to send to Ukraine, dampening Trump enthusiasm. 

• Minerals and mudslinging. Russian media has extensively covered the bickering and insult-trading between Presidents Trump and Zelensky, particularly after Zelensky appeared reluctant to hand over mineral rights to American interests. The sharp drop is in part explained by the negative energy in the coverage; much of it is not directly critical of Trump (more often voicing Zelensky’s criticism of him, Trump’s criticism of Zelensky, and the like), but the topic is much less cheery than the burst of pro-Trump enthusiasm in the days after the call.

Russian media sentiment around the United States more generally has held steady, even as Trump sentiment rose and fell. We saw familiar negative themes: the food is terrible and gives people stomach aches, the prisons are hellish, eggs cost too much, and a recession is surely on the way.

Our educated guess is that the gap between Trump sentiment and U.S. sentiment will narrow as time goes on, as data from the past few days suggests it has already begun to do. But at least for the moment, we see a gap between Russian coverage of Trump and its coverage of the United States as a whole. The Russian media still regards America as a chief adversary, but they are ready to praise Trump when his actions align with their own interests.

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