In a dramatic reversal, Donald Trump scrapped plans for a peace summit with Vladimir Putin in Budapest and imposed the first direct sanctions on Russia in his second term at the suggestion of Secretary of State Marco Rubio, who said Moscow was trying to prolong the war and delay ceasefire talks.

For months, US President Donald Trump has resisted calls to impose new sanctions on Russia, believing he could end the war with a deal with Vladimir Putin, even at a summit he planned next week in Budapest.

This week, Trump scrapped those plans and went a step further, imposing the first direct sanctions on Moscow in his second term. “It’s about time,” said the US president.

But the sudden shift is attributed to the assessment by Secretary of State Marco Rubio, a longtime critic of Moscow who has previously called Putin a “gangster,” that Russia had not made any substantial change in its stance, according to U.S. and European officials familiar with the matter.

The same sources, cited by Bloomberg, said Rubio canceled a planned meeting with Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov after a phone conversation in which he found the Kremlin was trying, once again, to delay ceasefire talks and prolong the war.

Rubio’s influence in the administration’s shift signals an even more expanded role for the US top diplomat, who has also advocated a more aggressive policy toward Venezuela, as Trump’s interim national security adviser. His stance contrasts with the more conciliatory line toward Russia espoused by Trump’s close friend and special envoy, Steve Witkoff.

White House spokeswoman Anna Kelly rejected the claim that Trump’s conversion was due to Rubio.

“President Trump has always led on foreign policy, and his agenda is carried out by national security officials like Secretary Rubio and Special Envoy Witkoff, who are a unified team behind the president’s America First vision,” he said.

There are no signs that Steve Witkoff, one of Donald Trump’s closest and most trusted aides, has lost his influence on the president or his role in the Russia affair. This week, Witkoff was touring the Middle East, overseeing the fragile Gaza truce he helped Trump broker.

However, according to sources familiar with the talks, Witkov’s contacts with Vladimir Putin and other senior Russian officials in the run-up to the previous summit in Alaska created confusion and the impression that Moscow was ready to make concessions it did not intend to make.

White House spokeswoman Anna Kelly denied this version, stressing that Witkoff is “absolutely clear with everyone” and that, together with Trump, they are working for peace “with a full and accurate understanding of all the factors that are going on.”

The August summit in Alaska was tense as Putin insisted on negotiating over Ukrainian territory, angering Trump and nearly walking out of the meeting, the sources said. This time, the preliminary work of the talks has been undertaken by Marco Rubio.

The State Department had earlier described Marco Rubio’s phone call with Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov as “productive.” Asked about Rubio’s role this time, State Department spokesman Tommy Pigott said “the entire team is fully united around President Trump’s leadership.”

Those who claim otherwise are “wrong,” he added. “Malicious actors promote selfish agendas through baseless lies,” he said. “President Trump and his team have already accomplished more on the road to peace than anyone thought possible, and, as the president said, that is due in large part to the unprecedented success of Special Envoy Witkoff.”

Despite a tense first meeting, Trump agreed last week to meet again with Vladimir Putin after a lengthy phone call. US officials hoped to build on the diplomatic momentum created after Trump was praised for brokering a truce that ended two years of hostilities between Israel and Hamas.

According to sources cited by US and European officials, Russia in recent days sent Washington a peace plan for Ukraine, in which it reiterated all its known positions, including the demand that Ukraine cede additional territory.

“Last time it took the meeting in Alaska for the United States to understand that there is no flexibility on the Russian side,” commented Liana Fix, senior fellow at the Council on Foreign Relations. “This time the awareness came before the meeting, which is a positive step.”

On the Russian side there was also confusion. Russian officials after the Putin-Trump phone call last week believed the US president had accepted Russia’s demand that Kiev cede the rest of the Donbas in exchange for limited territorial concessions from Moscow, according to a source close to the Kremlin.

But a day later, after meeting with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, Trump reiterated his desire for a ceasefire on existing front lines, a proposal Moscow had already rejected before the Alaska summit, the same source said. Lavrov highlighted that disagreement in his phone call with Marco Rubio on Monday.

By that point, the preparation for the summit had begun to fall apart.

Last February, when the Trump administration began its first direct talks with Russia, Rubio was sitting at the same table as Steve Witkoff in Saudi Arabia. This time, however, the foreign minister’s more direct involvement came as a relief to many European officials, who worried that the US, under Witkov, could move too close to Russian positions, putting pressure on Ukraine to accede to Moscow’s demands.

During Trump’s meeting with Zelensky last week, Vitkov reportedly pressed the Ukrainian president again to accept Putin’s demands to cede Donbas to Russia, the same sources said.

On Wednesday, the Trump administration announced new sanctions against Russia’s biggest oil companies, blacklisting state-owned giants Rosneft PJSC and Lukoil PJSC.

“Every time I talk to Vladimir we have good talks, but they’re not going anywhere,” Trump told reporters in the Oval Office after the sanctions were announced, adding that the White House might set up another meeting.

Despite the tensions, Rubio left open the possibility of further contacts with Moscow, including future meetings.

Speaking to reporters Wednesday night at Joint Base Andrews, shortly before his trip to Israel and Asia, Rubio said “we will always be interested in dialogue as long as there is an opportunity to achieve peace.”

“I think the president has said repeatedly, for months, that if there’s no progress on the peace deal, at some point he’s going to have to do something. Today was the day he decided to do it.”