In January 2025, news spread on the RuNet that, according to the son of the US president, the Ukrainian leader asked three times to be invited to Trump’s inauguration, but was refused each time. We have verified the authenticity of such publications.

On January 18, information appeared in Russian-language media and Telegram channels that Ukrainian President Vladimir Zelensky had repeatedly requested an invitation to the inauguration of the 47th US President Donald Trump, but did not receive the expected response. The source of this news is usually a story allegedly published by the son of the elected American leader, Donald Trump Jr. It is alleged that he not only made this story public, but also called Zelensky an eccentric, since he, despite the refusal, began to “behave as if he himself had decided not to go.”

The news with reference to Trump Jr. was published “RIA Novosti", "Constantinople", "Belta" And EADaily, as well as Telegram channels "Sanya in Florida"(528,000 views at the time of writing this analysis), "Legitimate"(383,000), "Evil proof"(294,000), "Two majors"(285,000), "ZeRada"(281,000), "Solovyov" (268,000), etc. "Arguments and facts", "News" And Lenta.ru they claim that another son of the American president, Barron, spoke about his refusal to invite Zelensky to Trump’s inauguration on social networks. In turn, the official representative of the Russian Foreign Ministry Maria Zakharova in her Telegram channel reported about the refusal received three times, without naming the source of information at all. Her post received more than 440,000 views.

Donald Trump for the second time entered inaugurated as President of the United States on January 20, 2025 in Washington. For the first time in 40 years, the ceremony was not held outdoors, in the Capitol Rotunda (as explained politician himself, due to the expected extremely cold weather). In his inaugural address, Trump didn't mention directly Russian invasion of Ukraine, although during the election campaign promised if elected, end the war within 24 hours. At the same time, the US President noted: “We will measure our success not only by the battles we win, but also by the wars we end, and, most importantly, by the wars we never enter.” The next day Trump saidthat Putin is destroying Russia by not wanting to make a ceasefire deal in Ukraine.

Another feature of the inauguration, which in the United States is considered an exclusively domestic political event, was the invitation of foreign leaders - both notes PBS, this is the first time in history that this has happened. In particular, ceremonial events visited Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni and Argentine President Javier Miley. Also among others at the ceremony were invited leaders of several right-wing and right-wing populist European parties and Chinese President Xi Jinping (instead of the Chinese leader, his deputy came to Washington). Russian President Vladimir Putin, according to words I did not receive an invitation from his press secretary, Dmitry Peskov.

As for Zelensky, on December 16, 2024, Trump stated: If the Ukrainian leader wants to attend the ceremony, he will be glad to see him. However, the President of Ukraine did not go to Washington on the day of the inauguration - he took in Kyiv a delegation from Lithuania, and then went at the economic forum in Davos, Switzerland. In an interview with journalist Piers Morgan, published On February 4, Zelensky said that Trump had invited him to his inauguration in very general terms, but he considered the trip not very appropriate since the American politician would not have time for a personal meeting.

At the same time, “Verified” did not find statements by Trump himself or members of his team about Zelensky’s possible participation in the inauguration, made after the words of the politician himself on December 16. Considering that this topic was of interest to many journalists who asked the US President-elect relevant questions, it is strange that Trump never publicly announced the requests of the Ukrainian leader and that he rejected them.

As noted above, the resources that disseminated the news we were considering referred to two different sons of the American president. Some cited 18-year-old Barron, the only child of Trump and his current wife Melania, as the source of information. The young man has only one account on social networks - verified profile in X, registered back in 2012. Although he has almost 50,000 followers, there is not a single tweet on the page. Apparently, Barron's mother created the account - in 2014-2015, Melania Trump more than 30 times tegala this profile, posting photos of your son or congratulating him on the holidays. The version of most other media is more realistic: 47-year-old Donald Trump Jr., the son of the US President from his first marriage, actively speaks out in support of his father’s policies and has already repeatedly criticized the Ukrainian authorities. For example, he statedthat the fires in Los Angeles in January could not be extinguished due to the transfer of the necessary equipment to Kyiv, called Ukraine is a corrupt country and posted mocking memes with Zelensky.

Some media outlets and Telegram channels not only refer to Donald Trump Jr., but also indicate that he spoke about his refusal to invite Zelensky to the inauguration in Instagram stories. Two slightly different screenshots are provided as evidence. Judging by the image, Trump Jr. allegedly reposted a publication from the American edition of Newsweek, consisting of a portrait of Vladimir Zelensky and the quote: “I can’t. I cannot, especially in times of war, come until President Trump invites me personally. I'm not sure it's appropriate to come because I know in general [foreign] leaders are not usually invited to the inauguration of a US president for some reason." The author of the story himself commented on these words as follows: “The funniest thing is that he unofficially asked for an invitation, or something, three times and was refused each time. Now he acts as if he himself decided not to go. What a weirdo."

Distributed screenshots. Source: Telegram

The two screenshots are almost identical. One of them shows that the story was published 22 hours before the user who took the screenshot saw it. The image is of poor quality, and the background on which the account nickname and time of publication are placed differs from the rest. This may indicate that the image was based on another user’s story, which was superimposed with Trump Jr.’s username and profile photo. Another screenshot additionally blurs out the time of publication - apparently, this is just an edited version of the first one. It also cuts off typical elements of such screenshots, such as the comment line and the like symbol at the bottom of the screen, and both the time, the phone's battery level, and the Internet connection indicator at the top of the screen. Note that on Instagram, Donald Trump Jr. signed There are 8.7 million users, so it is extremely unlikely that such a resonant statement by the son of the US President could be recorded only once (Verified did not find any other screenshots).

Fragments of distributed screenshots. Source: Telegram

The quote given at the bottom of the screenshot (adjusted for translation) actually belongs to Zelensky. He made a very similar statement in Ukrainian in podcast Lex Friedman on January 5, 2025, when the host asked the politician if he wanted to attend Trump's inauguration. The next day Newsweek published a note about this interview, which contained the same translation of the phrase into English as in the screenshot. However, in the verified account There are no publications on Instagram with this statement.

However, there is every reason to believe that the screenshot of Trump Jr.’s stories was falsified. Firstly, the episode of Friedman’s podcast with Zelensky was released on January 5, and the son of the US president, according to the viral image, reacted to the Ukrainian president’s statement almost two weeks later. Secondly, although stories on Instagram become inaccessible to other users a day after publication, in the case of Trump Jr., even such short-lived posts often manage to get the attention of major media outlets. For example, in the fall he shared in stories fasting ex-candidate for US Vice President from the Republican Party Sarah Palin, in which the video with Zelensky was accompanied by the comment: “POV (point of view, “personal opinion”, English - Ed.): In 38 days you will lose your benefits.” Then they wrote about it The Telegraph, Politico, Newsweek etc. Thirdly, although Trump’s eldest son also leaves political comments on Instagram, he mainly uses his more popular one (14.2 million subscribers) for this. account on social network X. Some publications it duplicates from there to other platforms. But on Trump Jr.’s X page there are no posts about Zelensky’s informal requests to invite him to the inauguration.

Finally, the chronology of the dissemination of the screenshot, which occurred mainly in Russian-language media and Telegram channels, is indicative. The earliest post that contains this image that could be found is "Verified" was posted January 17 at 17:23 Moscow time in the Telegram channel “Gagauz Republic” (9100 views). The falsified screenshot is shown there in full. However, the news began to spread widely on the RuNet only on January 19, which was facilitated, for example, by publication in the Telegram channel “Pool N3” (101,000 views), which appeared that day shortly before noon. There, the screenshot first appeared with the time of publication blurred, after which this particular version of the picture became viral. Both these channel have repeatedly appeared in “Verified” analyzes as distributors of false information. In the meantime, on January 18, the screenshot began to spread throughout the English-language segment X, some publications received more than 1 million views. After this, Newsweek, whose logo is used in the screenshot, deniedthat he has ever published such a post with a portrait of Zelensky and his quote from Friedman’s podcast.

Thus, there is no evidence that Donald Trump Jr. published stories (or spoke in other sources) about Vladimir Zelensky’s repeated requests to invite him to the inauguration of the US President. The spread of the news began from pro-Kremlin Telegram channels and contains numerous signs of falsification.

Cover photo: Wikimedia Commons