"They have extremely valuable land in terms of rare earth [minerals], in terms of oil and gas, in terms of other things. I want to protect our money because we're spending hundreds of billions of dollars," Trump said.

"The Ukrainians can make a deal to end the war with Russia. Or they can not make a deal and not make a deal. They may become Russians one day, or they may not become Russians. But all that money that we spent on them, I want back. And I told them I want the equivalent of $500 billion in rare earth minerals. And they have essentially already agreed to do that," Trump said in an interview.