President Trump will depart the White House early Friday morning for a trip to Alaska where he will meet Russian President Vladimir Putin for a high-stakes summit centered on ending the war in Ukraine.

Trump is expected in Anchorage mid-afternoon EDT on Friday. The initial meeting with Putin is expected to take place at 3:30 p.m. EDT with just the two leaders and translators, Kremlin aide Yuri Ushakov said Thursday, according to NBC News.

White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt told Fox & Friends early Thursday that following the meeting, Trump and Putin with hold a lunch with members of delegations from both countries.

Ushakov told reports on a call in Moscow that the Russian delegation will include himself, Putin, Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov, Defense Minister Andrei Belousov, Finance Minister Anton Siluanov and Putin's longtime friend and investment envoy Kirill Dmitriev, NBC reported.

The two leaders then plan to hold a joint press conference following their meeting, White House and Kremlin officials said Thursday morning. The Russian state news agency TASS had previously reported that Trump and Putin would hold a press conference together at the conclusion of Friday's meeting. Leavitt later confirmed that was the "plan."

Trump told "The Brian Kilmeade Show" that he was planning to host a press conference with or without Putin, regardless of the meeting's outcome.

Trump will meet with Putin at Joint Base Elmendorf-Richardson near Anchorage. It will mark the first time Putin has visited the U.S. since 2015.

"The president wants to exhaust all options to try to bring this war to a peaceful resolution," Leavitt said.

"What comes after that meeting is up to President Trump, and that's part of the reason he is going," Leavitt added. "He has incredible instincts, and he wants to sit down and look the Russian president in the eye and see what progress can be made to move the ball forward to end this brutal war."

The last time Trump and Putin met in person was in Helsinki, Finland in 2018 for a summit during Trump's first term. That meeting, and the subsequent press conference that followed, was met with huge controversy in the U.S. when Trump appeared to side with Putin -- and against the U.S. Intelligence community -- in accepting Putin denying involvement in the 2016 election.

The two leaders early Thursday also offered their perspectives on the summit.

Putin told a group of advisers that he believes the Trump administration is making "energetic and sincere efforts to stop the fighting, stop the crisis and reach agreements that are of interest to all parties involved in this conflict," NBC news reported, according to a translated read out from the Kremlin.

Trump told Brian Kilmeade on his Fox News Radio show that there is a "25 percent chance" his meeting with Putin on Friday is not successful.

"This meeting sets up the second meeting," Trump said. "But there is a 25 percent chance this meeting will not be a successful meeting. In which case I will run the country."

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky will not be at the Alaska summit, Trump has confirmed. The president later told Kilmeade that he had three potential locations in mind for a second meeting that included Zelensky if Friday's meeting goes well.

The White House, for its part, has sought to temper expectations for the meeting, describing it as a "listening exercise" and a chance for Trump to potentially set up a follow-up meeting involving both Putin and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky.

Trump had pledged on the campaign trail to end the war in Ukraine within 24 hours of taking office. He has since said that timeline was sarcastic.