MARY LOUISE KELLY, HOST:
President Trump will speak with Russian President Vladimir Putin on Tuesday to see if Russia will also agree to the 30-day ceasefire that Ukraine agreed to last week. Now, most Ukrainians do not believe Putin will negotiate in good faith, and many now also wonder if the U.S. can be counted on after the way Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy was treated by Trump and Vice President JD Vance last month in the Oval Office. Ukrainians are rallying around their leader and finding dark humor in the uncertainty, as NPR's Eleanor Beardsley reports from Kyiv.
ELEANOR BEARDSLEY, BYLINE: When Ukrainians saw their president berated in the White House last month, it gave him a shot in the political arm back home, says Anton Grushetsky, director of the Kyiv International Institute of Sociology, which measures public opinion. He says Zelenskyy's approval rating jumped 10% and is now pushing 70.
ANTON GRUSHETSKY: We need to understand that people perceived all these attacks not as attacks on solely Zelenskyy, but as attacks on the whole Ukraine and all Ukrainians. So people are furious. And actually, more people are united around the president.
MIHAIL SMETANA: Thank you.
BEARDSLEY: Kyiv resident Mihail Smetana says he's certainly noticed that. We meet at an outdoor food market in the city.
SMETANA: On my Facebook account, many people that I know hate Zelenskyy, but they will actually support him here.
BEARDSLEY: But as usual, it doesn't take Ukrainians long to find comedy amidst the tragedy, with memes and jokes going viral. One Ukrainian TikTok star played his guitar to a little ditty he composed about the Oval Office spat.
(SOUNDBITE OF TIKTOK VIDEO)
UNIDENTIFIED TIKTOKER: (Singing in non-English language).
BEARDSLEY: Because this is how Ukrainians cope, says Smetana.
SMETANA: We make jokes of everything, and that helps us surviving this - the whole war with survival memes (laughter).
BEARDSLEY: One aspect of Zelenskyy's White House dressing down has gotten a lot of mockery, when Vice President JD Vance accused him of not being grateful enough.
(SOUNDBITE OF INSTAGRAM REEL)
PRESIDENT VOLODYMYR ZELENSKYY: Thank you for your support, every American citizen.
BEARDSLEY: This Instagram reel strings together examples of Zelenskyy's effusive public gratitude to America - some 94 instances since the full-scale invasion, according to the video. Another meme shows some of the other leaders who've shown up at the White House not wearing suits. There's Winston Churchill, Narendra Modi and, of course, Elon Musk, who even keeps his baseball cap on inside the Oval Office.
GRUSHETSKY: Humor is - it's a very important psychological mechanism to cope with this creation.
BEARDSLEY: But, says sociologist Grushetsky, the humor also masks the hurt and anxiety Ukrainians feel on possibly being abandoned by their most important ally.
(SOUNDBITE OF GLASSES CLINKING)
BEARDSLEY: In a Kyiv coffee shop, student Julia Mala says there's a perception here that the Trump administration is suddenly treating Russia like a good-faith partner, and that's distressing.
JULIA MALA: We want to say it very clear that Russia, it's not like some good guys, and we could talk. They killed our people, and they keep in doing it. And we want to say it clear that this is enemy.
(SOUNDBITE OF FOOTSTEPS)
BEARDSLEY: I meet 34-year-old Taras strolling in a Kyiv park. While he doesn't want to give his last name, he says it's unnerving to hear President Trump parroting what he calls Kremlin propaganda that Ukraine needs to hold elections.
TARAS: Those who demand elections are completely ignorant about the security situation. Just imagine how many Ukrainians are refugees in foreign countries. How many Ukrainians are displaced? How many Ukrainians are currently on the front line?
BEARDSLEY: How could you possibly find and get ballots to everyone, he asks. And as for security, forget it. Polling stations would make perfect targets for Russian ballistic missiles.
Eleanor Beardsley, NPR News, Kyiv. Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.
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