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Russia’s top economic envoy has arrived in the United States for “official” talks, a person with knowledge of the visit exclusively told CNN on Friday, days after President Donald Trump announced tough new sanctions against Russia.
Kirill Dmitriev, head of Russia’s sovereign wealth fund (RDIF) and special envoy to the Kremlin, will meet with Trump administration officials “to continue discussions on U.S.-Russian relations,” the sources said.
A White House official told CNN that Trump’s special envoy, Steve Witkoff, is scheduled to meet with Dmitriev in Miami, Florida, on Saturday. Republican Rep. Anna Paulina Luna is also scheduled to meet with the Russian envoy, a person familiar with the trip told CNN.
Earlier this month, Luna posted on social media that she was planning a meeting with Dmitriev, saying it was important that the United States “continue to foster peace and trade relations and dialogue” with Russia. “Both countries don’t have to be enemies; allies in trade benefit everyone,” she said.
Dmitriev said in a post on XFriday that his visit was “planned some time ago based on an invitation from the American side.” He added that the dialogue between Russia and the United States “is extremely important for the world and must continue with a full understanding of Russia’s position and respect for its national interests.”
The visit comes amid growing frustration in the United States over the Kremlin’s refusal to end the war in Ukraine, and after President Trump said he had “cancelled” a planned summit with Kremlin President Vladimir Putin. The Trump administration on Wednesday called on Russia to agree to an immediate ceasefire in the war with Ukraine and imposed sanctions on Russia’s two largest oil companies, Rosneft and Lukoil.
President Putin said the sanctions would have little impact on Russia’s economy and described them as an attempt to put pressure on Russia.
“No self-respecting country would ever do anything under pressure,” he said Thursday.
The Russian leader said that in a conversation with President Trump, he warned that sanctions would affect global oil prices, including in the United States.
Dmitriev is a prominent Kremlin supporter of closer economic cooperation between Russia and the United States, and recently proposed building a “Trump-Putin” tunnel between Alaska and Russia’s Far East.
Born in Soviet-era Ukraine and educated at Harvard and Stanford universities in the US, Dmitriev worked as a consultant at the US consulting firm McKinsey and as an investment banker at Goldman Sachs.
Following Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February 2022, Dmitriev was sanctioned by the U.S. Treasury Department, which designated him as a “close aide to President Putin and his family.”
In April, Dmitriev became the first Russian official to visit Washington DC since Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine. His visit, where he met with President Trump’s special envoy Steve Witkoff, was seen as an important step in the then-warming relationship between the Kremlin and the White House.
Sources told CNN in April that the U.S. government temporarily lifted sanctions against Dmitriev in order to allow the State Department to issue him a visa to the United States.
Description: This article has been updated to reflect details of Rep. Anna Paulina Luna’s plans to meet with Dmitriev.
