Fact check: No, Zelenskyy doesn't have 4% approval as Trump claims; it's over 50%
LONDON -- President Donald Trump on Tuesday joined Russian President Vladimir Putin in claiming Ukraine's President Volodymyr Zelenskyy lacks legitimacy, the American leader alleging -- without providing evidence -- that Zelenskyy currently has a 4% approval rating among his compatriots.
In reality, respected polls in Ukraine show that Zelenskyy has over 50% approval among Ukrainians. The most recent, published by the Kyiv International Institute of Sociology (KIIS) in early February, showed that 57% of respondents said they trusted Zelenskyy.
Zelenskyy's level of support is diminished from the extraordinary highs of earlier in the war. He scored 77% trust in a KIIS poll from December 2023 and 90% in May 2022, around three months after Russia's invasion. The February poll did show a 5% bump in trust from December 2024.
Still, the 50% or more regularly scored by Zelenskyy in various polls is higher than those achieved by many democratic leaders around the world.
Aides in Kyiv were quick to point out on Wednesday that Zelenskyy's recent score of 57% in the KIIS poll was higher than Trump's backing in recent U.S. surveys -- for example, 46.6% with 538, 47% with YouGov/The Economist and 48% with Gallup.
There is currently no politician in Ukraine considered to have stronger support than Zelenskyy. Only Ukraine's former commander-in-chief, Gen. Valerii Zaluzhnyi, is considered a real potential challenger, though he is serving as Kyiv's ambassador to the U.K. and has not yet entered politics.
Hours after historic U.S.-Russia talks concluded in Saudi Arabia, Trump suggested to reporters at Mar-a-Lago that Zelenskyy's alleged low public approval meant the country should hold a new presidential election, its 2024 contest having been postponed because Ukraine has been under martial law since Putin's invasion three years ago.
"That's not a Russia thing, that's something coming from me and coming from many other countries also," Trump said.
Trump's claims indicated that he -- like Putin -- may now be seeking Zelenskyy's removal as part of any deal to end the war.
Putin appears to see removing Zelenskyy as a key goal, both as a victory he can present to Russians and as a potential opportunity to install a pro-Russian leader in his place. That is why the Russian president is pushing for elections to be held before any final peace deal.
Trump now appears to perhaps hold a similar view.
Zelenskyy pushed back firmly on Wednesday, fact-checking Trump and saying he was suffering from exposure to Russian disinformation.
"If someone wants to replace me right now, then right now it won't work," the president told reporters in Kyiv before a planned meeting with Trump's Ukraine-Russia envoy Keith Kellogg.
"If we are talking about 4% then we have seen this disinformation, we understand that it comes from Russia," he added. "And we have evidence."
The president said he would conduct opinion polls for trust ratings for world leaders, including Trump, British Prime Minister Keir Starmer and Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan.
Zelenskyy said he took Trump's comments "calmly."
"As for President Trump, with all due respect to him as a leader of the American people, who we deeply respect and are thankful for all his support, but President Trump, unfortunately, is living in this disinformation space," Zelenskyy continued.
