If everything goes according to plan, this trip will mark Putin's eighth visit to the U.S. during his presidency, a role he has held for 20 years across two separate terms. Trump is hosting the meeting to try to push Moscow into a peace deal with Ukraine.

President Donald Trump has often bragged about his warm relationship with Russia’s Vladimir Putin. But in the months leading up to the leaders’ first meeting in six years, Trump began asking Europeans and White House aides what’s changed about his counterpart.

Whether the U.S.-Russia summit can lead to a deal to produce peace in Ukraine more than 3 1/2 years after Moscow’s invasion remains to be seen.