by Jacob Fischler, Arkansas Advocate
August 18, 2025

President Donald Trump, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy and European allies at the White House Monday celebrated Russian President Vladimir Putin’s concession of NATO-like security protections for Ukraine as part of a future peace deal between the two countries.

In a social media post on Monday night, Trump said he called Putin after the meetings were over and began arrangements for a meeting between Putin and Zelenskyy, at a location to be determined. After that meeting, all three would meet, Trump said.

At the White House earlier, Zelenskyy and officials from Western Europe called Putin’s acceptance of security guarantees for Ukraine protecting the nation against another attack a major step toward ending the three-year-old war. 

Dating to before the war, one point of tension between Ukraine and Russia has been Ukraine’s increasingly warm relationship with the West, with potential membership in NATO a major issue for Putin.

But Trump said Putin accepted something like it during the pair’s meeting in Alaska last week.

“The Alaska summit reinforced my belief that, while difficult, peace is within reach,” Trump said before a group meeting in the White House’s East Room. “In a very significant step, President Putin agreed that Russia would accept security guarantees for Ukraine.”

Trump and Zelenskyy met one-on-one in the Oval Office before a handful of European leaders joined them for a multilateral meeting in the East Room.

During introductions for the multilateral meeting, Zelenskyy said it had been his best meeting with Trump to date, and he was “very happy” with Trump about the possibility of winning security guarantees.

“We spoke about it, and we will speak more about security guarantees,” he said. “This is very important that (the) United States gives such (a) strong signal and is ready for security guarantees.”

The other attendees Monday were NATO Secretary General Mark Rutte, European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen, German Chancellor Friedrich Merz, Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni, French President Emmanuel Macron, British Prime Minister Keir Starmer and Finnish President Alexander Stubb.

‘Article 5-like’

Several European allies highlighted the issue of security guarantees for Ukraine, which they compared to the NATO charter’s Article 5 that compels every member state to defend any other member that has been attacked.

“It’s very good to hear that we’re working on the security guarantees,” von der Leyen said. “Article 5-like security guarantees: so important.”

The next step in the peace process would be to set up direct talks between Putin and Zelenskyy, possibly also to include Trump.

Trump said he had spoken to Putin “indirectly” on Monday and that he planned to phone the Russian president following the meeting with European leaders.

Ceasefire needed?

Before meeting with Putin, Trump had supported a ceasefire as a path toward a permanent end to the war, though he came out of the Alaska summit closer to Putin’s position that a ceasefire was not necessary before a final peace agreement.

Monday, he said he would like a ceasefire to immediately end violence, but that it was not strictly necessary from a diplomatic point of view. The United States had helped negotiate the ends of other conflicts without a temporary ceasefire in place, he said.

“All of us would obviously prefer an immediate ceasefire while we work on a lasting peace,” he said. “I don’t know that it’s necessary.”

Germany’s Merz pushed back, saying a ceasefire should be a precondition for a Putin-Zelenskyy meeting.

“I can’t imagine that the next meeting would take place without a ceasefire,” Merz said. “So let’s work on that, and let’s try to put pressure on Russia, because the credibility of these efforts we are undertaking today are depending on at least a ceasefire from the beginning of the serious negotiations.”

Smoother meeting with Zelenskyy in suit

At the open-press portion of Trump’s meeting with Zelenskyy, the two appeared on friendlier terms than they had during the Ukrainian leader’s last Oval Office visit in February, when Trump and Vice President JD Vance complained Zelenskyy was not appreciative enough of U.S. aid.

As the February meeting turned heated, Trump told Zelenskyy he had “no cards” to fight Russia on his own or make demands of the United States.

But Monday, Trump resisted an option to return to that argument, brushing off a reporter’s question about which country had “better cards.”

And Zelesnkyy also wore an all-black suit Monday after a writer at a pro-Trump media outlet questioned him at the February meeting about wearing military-style attire.

“You look fabulous in that suit,” the same writer said Monday.

“I said the same thing,” Trump echoed.

Last updated 6:14 p.m., Aug. 18, 2025

Arkansas Advocate is part of States Newsroom, a nonprofit news network supported by grants and a coalition of donors as a 501c(3) public charity. Arkansas Advocate maintains editorial independence. Contact Editor Sonny Albarado for questions: info@arkansasadvocate.com.

The post Trump, Zelenskyy exit White House talks hopeful about security guarantee for Ukraine appeared first on arkansasadvocate.com

Note: The following A.I. based commentary is not part of the original article, reproduced above, but is offered in the hopes that it will promote greater media literacy and critical thinking, by making any potential bias more visible to the reader –Staff Editor.

Political Bias Rating: Center-Right

This content portrays former President Donald Trump in a positive light, emphasizing his diplomatic efforts and constructive engagement with European leaders regarding the Ukraine conflict. The article highlights Trump’s role in advancing security guarantees for Ukraine and presents his interactions with allies and adversaries in a favorable, solution-focused manner. While it includes perspectives from European leaders, the overall tone and framing suggest a moderate conservative stance with a focus on Trump’s leadership and diplomatic initiatives.

SUMMARY: A Rogers father, Conrad Henson, says his daughter was dropped off at a grocery store instead of her bus stop on the first day of school. Rogers Public Schools states that if a student is on the wrong bus, the driver should return them to school or their stop. Henson’s daughter, a sophomore who rides multiple buses, was dropped off at Harp’s grocery store after a bus transfer mix-up. The district says the confusion began when the student boarded the wrong bus due to incorrect information given to the family. Officials apologized and plan to meet with bus drivers to prevent future incidents.

Rogers Public School bus drops student off at grocer store, the father wants answers Subscribe to 40/29 on YouTube now for …

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by Tess Vrbin, Arkansas Advocate
August 15, 2025

Arkansas lawmakers on Friday questioned whether the state Insurance Department is doing enough to enforce regulations on pharmacy benefit managers, the national prescription drug middlemen that have long frustrated state officials and local pharmacists.

Pharmacy benefit managers (PBMs) negotiate prescription benefits among drug manufacturers, distributors, pharmacies and health insurance providers, and the biggest ones also own pharmacies and insurers.

The Insurance Department has been receiving fewer complaints from pharmacists alleging illegal behavior from PBMs since December, when the Arkansas Legislative Council approved a rule to require PBMs to include “fair and reasonable” dispensing fees in their reimbursements for prescription drugs, Daniel Holland, general counsel for the department’s PBM division, told the council Friday.

Pharmacies sent the department roughly 3,000 complaints in 2024, claiming PBMs either paid them below the national average of what drugstores pay wholesalers for drugs or paid them at or just above this amount, AID’s general counsel told lawmakers last year. This practice has been illegal since the state enacted Act 900 of 2015.

The Insurance Department analyzed 3,347 data reports from health plans and PBMs and found that 654, or 19%, “consistently reimburse pharmacies below NADAC,” the national average drug acquisition cost, according to the department’s report to the council. These 654 plans, managed by 12 PBMs found to be violating state law, “cover approximately 340,000 Arkansas lives,” the report states.

The Insurance Department asked six of the 12 PBMs for corrective action plans within the past month. Those drug benefit managers have until next month to implement those plans and report back to the department, which “will then evaluate whether those PBMs have increased their average reimbursement to NADAC along with a fair and reasonable cost to dispense,” the report states. The other six PBMs claimed confusion about the request or problems with the data.

“All of this is in an effort to figure out exactly how many plans are paying below NADAC on average so that we can minimize the impact of the cost to dispense [drugs],” Holland said.

The amount the Insurance Department fines a PBM for violating Act 900 ranges from “extremely low” to $5,000, and it depends on the amount the company pays a pharmacy below the average acquisition cost, he said.

“There wasn’t a lot of certainty as to what the consequence was for payments below NADAC,” Holland said. “I’m trying to create that certainty so that everybody kind of knows [this is] where we start, and if we see a pattern, we’re going to go up, all the way to the point of possibly pulling or denying a license.”

Between June and July, the Insurance Department initiated nine new enforcement actions over 26 prescriptions reimbursed below NADAC, the report states. The investigations “will result in consent orders that include statutory penalties” or an Insurance Department administrative order if a PBM under investigation requests an administrative hearing.

Lawmakers’ concerns

Independent pharmacists said in September 2024 that they were struggling to stay open in rural areas with limited healthcare resources thanks to low PBM reimbursements. Lawmakers went on to pass the dispensing fee rule on a temporary and later permanent basis, though one Legislative Council subcommittee rejected the option and was overruled by the full council.

Sen. Jonathan Dismang, R-Searcy, clarified to his fellow lawmakers that the rule was about dispensing fees rather than about NADAC reimbursements, even though much of the Insurance Department’s report focused on the latter.

“Let’s make sure everyone’s paying everything they’re supposed to be first before we start talking about what it means for a dispensing fee [to be] fair and reasonable,” Dismang said Friday.

Holland confirmed that this is the department’s goal, but some lawmakers said pharmacies in their district are still struggling financially eight months after the rule passed.

“Fair and reasonable is one thing… [but] the local pharmacists are telling me that the PBMs are at fault and they’re not seeing the action that they need to see,” said Rep. Jim Wooten, R-Beebe.

Rep. Jack Ladyman, R-Jonesboro, said his constituents have told him similar things and asked Holland if the Insurance Department can “speed up this process.” Holland said the department should be able to assess the rest of its PBM data in the next 30 days.

At several lawmakers’ request, Holland agreed to compile a report detailing how many penalties the Insurance Department has levied against PBMs, how much money the penalties total, how many PBMs have been fined and how much the volume of complaints about PBMs has decreased this year.

After more than a century serving Benton, Smith-Caldwell Drug Store closed in August 2023 due to financial insolvency and transferred its clients to Walgreens. Republican Sen. Kim Hammer, who represents Benton, said he believed the department should issue harsher penalties for PBMs that violate state regulations instead of increasing penalties gradually until they reach $5,000.

“I’d like the agency to quit pussyfooting around with [PBMs],” Hammer said. “‘Fair and reasonable’ has been a discussion for way too long.”

Three pharmacy benefit managers — OptumRx, Express Scripts and CVS Caremark — manage 79% of prescription drug insurance claims for approximately 270 million people, according to a July 2024 Federal Trade Commission report.

All three PBMs were among five plaintiffs that sued Arkansas in federal court over Act 624 of 2025. Hammer was a lead sponsor of the first-in-the-nation law, which would have banned PBMs from holding a permit to operate a drug store in Arkansas after Jan. 1, 2026.

The other two plaintiffs against Act 624 are the Navitus Health Solutions PBM and the Pharmaceutical Care Management Association. The latter sued Arkansas over Act 900 of 2015, and the U.S. Supreme Court upheld the law in 2020.

A federal judge temporarily blocked Act 624 in July, agreeing with the plaintiffs that the law “likely violates” the U.S. Constitution’s commerce clause and is “likely preempted” by a veterans’ health care program.

Act 624’s supporters have said the law is necessary to ensure patients’ access to prescription medications, particularly for patients who live in rural areas or need highly specific drugs. The law received overwhelming bipartisan support in the House and Senate.

Arkansas Advocate is part of States Newsroom, a nonprofit news network supported by grants and a coalition of donors as a 501c(3) public charity. Arkansas Advocate maintains editorial independence. Contact Editor Sonny Albarado for questions: info@arkansasadvocate.com.

The post Arkansas lawmakers urge insurance department to ‘speed up’ regulating pharmacy benefit managers appeared first on arkansasadvocate.com

Note: The following A.I. based commentary is not part of the original article, reproduced above, but is offered in the hopes that it will promote greater media literacy and critical thinking, by making any potential bias more visible to the reader –Staff Editor.

Political Bias Rating: Center-Left

This content primarily focuses on regulatory oversight and enforcement concerning pharmacy benefit managers (PBMs) in Arkansas, emphasizing protection for independent pharmacists and rural healthcare access. The detailed reporting on state actions to hold PBMs accountable and the challenges posed by large corporate entities aligns with a center-left perspective that supports government intervention to promote fairness and protect smaller businesses and consumers. However, the article maintains a factual tone, presents multiple viewpoints including Republican lawmakers’ concerns, and does not overtly advocate for progressive or partisan policy positions, placing it near the center of the political spectrum with a mild lean towards regulatory intervention consistent with center-left values.