Fiona Hill: Summit with Biden was ‘a very important’ symbolic win for Putin

Fiona Hill said on Sunday that last week’s summit with President Biden was a “very important win” For Russian President Vladimir Putin in terms of symbolism.

Host Chuck Todd on NBC’s “Meet the Press” asked Hill, a former National Security Council official for Russian and European affairs who served under former President Trump, if she thought that Putin had gotten more out of the meeting than Biden.

“Well, in terms of the symbolism of having a sit-down with the American president, absolutely. That is a very important win for Putin,” Hill said.

“But it’s not a win if nothing happens out of it,” she added.

“That is just an episodic event, and, you know, he can’t take that to the bank for a long time and cash it in. He’s got to basically present himself at home as the great statesman because he himself has to subject his presidency to a reelection,” Hill added, noting that despite Putin’s intentions of staying in power until 2036, he must still secure a popular vote victory in 2024.

WATCH: @ChuckTodd asks Fiona Hill: “Did Putin get more of [the Biden-Putin summit] than we realized?”

Hill: “In terms of the symbolism of having a sit-down with the American president … that is a very important win for Putin. But it’s not a win if nothing happens out of it.” pic.twitter.com/zwdDMUwDO8

— Meet the Press (@MeetThePress) June 20, 2021

Hill noted that Putin has multiple issues hounding him in Russia, including an abysmal COVID-19 vaccination rate, with only about 10 percent of the country’s 144 million people vaccinated.

“So Putin’s got to figure out how to navigate things. He can’t just basically live off an episodic meeting with the United States president in Geneva for months to come,” she added.

“The problem with the previous administration, with President Trump, for Vladimir Putin is fantastic meetings from his perspective,” Hill said. “He was able to push all of our political buttons — make fun of us, humiliate us, always have sit-downs that he wanted to or telephone calls, but he never got any kinds of agreements. And so that really, you know, wasn’t all that worthwhile. So he has to get something out of this as well.”