U.S. President Donald Trump and Russian President Vladimir Putin are set to meet in Alaska on Friday.
The announcement immediately raised many questions for Alaskans, chief among them: Where?
The White House has yet to release any specifics on where the two leaders will convene, how long the meeting will last or any other relevant logistics.
Officials in Alaska are not sure, either.
As of Monday — three days after Trump announced the summit — neither the Alaska governor nor the state’s two U.S. senators were able to share details about their visit, their spokespeople said. Anchorage Mayor Suzanne LaFrance said early Monday that the city had not been involved in discussions around a potential visit but was willing to assist.
Adding to confusion surrounding the event, in a Monday press conference, Trump said that he is “going to Russia on Friday.” Preparations for the meeting, however, are moving ahead in Alaska.
In a sign of solidifying plans, the Federal Aviation Administration published a notice Monday closing miles of airspace around Anchorage on Friday because of VIP travel around the city. Shannon McCarthy, spokesperson for the Alaska Department of Transportation and Public Facilities, said that there are several temporary flight restrictions scheduled for this Friday.
“There could also be traffic delays across the municipality,” McCarthy said, adding that the department will have more information on which roads will be affected in the coming days. “Because we have so many VIPs moving, we anticipate that they could be arriving at different airports.”
[What to know about the historic Trump-Putin summit in Alaska]
If history is any precedent, it’s possible the two leaders may meet within an airport, such as Ted Stevens Anchorage International Airport.
President Ronald Reagan and Pope John Paul II met in the Fairbanks International Airport in May 1984. After greeting an audience assembled at the airport, Reagan and the pope conversed privately in a converted terminal lounge during the pontiff’s two-hour stop in Alaska, the Daily News reported at the time.
In September 1971, President Richard Nixon met with Hirohito, emperor of Japan, at Elmendorf Air Force Base in Anchorage. Five thousand spectators packed in a hangar to watch Nixon welcome the Japanese emperor — whose stop in Anchorage on his way to Europe lasted less than two hours.
Alaska has a limited number of landing strips that can accommodate both Air Force One and the Russian presidential plane, and very few of them are near commercial or civic infrastructure that can accommodate large numbers of dignitaries, diplomats and security personnel. Anchorage’s Joint Base Elmendorf-Richardson, along with Anchorage’s international airport, are possible candidates for a summit.
[Governor says ‘Alaska stands ready’ to host Trump meeting with Putin]
If the two world leaders seek to venture outside an airport, one likely destination may be Anchorage’s Hotel Captain Cook, which in recent years has hosted both foreign leaders and a U.S. president — though not at the same time.
The downtown hotel’s seasoned employees are no strangers to the demands of the Secret Service and foreign security details.
Chinese President Xi Jinping dined at the hotel in 2017 on his way home after meeting Trump in Florida. During his four-hour foray into the city, Xi traveled in a 24-vehicle motorcade down the Seward Highway — which was closed to traffic for the occasion — before meeting with then-Gov. Bill Walker and then-Mayor Ethan Berkowitz at the Crow’s Nest restaurant on the top floor of the Captain Cook.
When former President Barack Obama visited Alaska in 2015, he and many top officials stayed in the Hotel Captain Cook. While Xi’s stopover lacked significant forewarning, Obama’s stay in the city was preceded by months of preparation by White House staff. Advance work likely included background checks of hotel employees and blocking off multiple hotel floors, the Daily News reported at the time. Obama also made short visits to other communities in the state, but slept only at the Captain Cook.
More recently, Trump and former President Joe Biden have made refueling stops at Joint Base Elmendorf-Richardson numerous times. During those visits, they did not leave the installation. Out of office, Trump visited Anchorage in 2022 for a campaign rally for GOP candidates Kelly Tshibaka and former Gov. Sarah Palin, which took place at the Alaska Airlines Center.
A diplomatic summit this week would coincide with two large-scale military exercises happening in Alaska. Northern Edge, a biennial exercise that mobilizes thousands of troops in the state’s waters and airspace, is scheduled to start on Thursday and last through Aug. 29. Simultaneously, the Arctic Edge 2025 exercises running through the entire month of August have brought military assets not only to Alaska’s main bases by Anchorage and Fairbanks, but also around Cold Bay, Kotzebue and Nome.
Officials with both the 11th Air Force and 673rd Air Base Wing, which oversees the Joint Base Elmendorf-Richardson installation, referred questions on presidential activities to the White House press office.
The White House press office did not respond to questions from the Daily News.
Former Alaska Lt. Gov. Mead Treadwell has been involved in several significant diplomatic and high-profile meetings in Alaska over the decades, and said the state is both symbolically and logistically sensible for the parties involved.
“There’s a couple constraints on this, but (Putin) can fly here relatively quickly, and Trump can fly here relatively quickly, and it’s perceived as a kind of ground that was once Russian and is now American, so you’ve got all that,” Treadwell said. “We’re known as a good flag stop.”
In spite of the relatively short timeline for scheduling such a high-profile event, Treadwell said he’s confident Trump will be in Alaska on Friday.
