Former President Donald Trump has kept in regular touch with Russian President Vladimir Putin since leaving office – holding more than a handful of phone calls with him, according to bombshell allegations in Bob Woodward’s new book.
Woodward describes the extent of the contacts and attributes them to a Trump aide in his new book War, CNN reported.
There were ‘maybe as many as seven’ after Trump left office in 2021, Woodward writes. And the timeline extends until after Putin’s bloody invasion of Ukraine.
The intervening period has featured brutal missile and drone strikes on Ukrainian cities and town, and a resulting flood of U.S. and allied sanctions against Russia as well as Putin and members of his circle.
Trump has stated repeatedly at his campaign events that Russia never would have invaded Ukraine if he had still been in office.
During the height of the pandemic in 2020, Trump also sent Putin a secret stash of Abbott covid test machines ‘for his personal use’, Woodward reports.
It came at a time of gestures of solidarity as the pandemic spread, but Putin reportedly wanted to keep it hush-hush.
Phone a friend? Former President Donald Trump has held as many as seven phone calls with Vladimir Putin since leaving office, according to Bob Woodward’s new book. Trump has repeatedly vouched for his good relations with the Russian dictator
‘Please don’t tell anybody you sent these to me,’ Putin told Trump, according to Woodward. ‘I don’t care,’ Trump told him. ‘Fine.’
‘I don’t want you to tell anybody because people will get mad at you, not me,’ Putin told him, the Washington Post reported.
Woodward interviewed Trump for his last book, but Trump publicly attacked the author.
Putin kept an extraordinary level of isolation during during the onset of the pandemic, and some experts believe his being cut off from outside contact may have contributed to his decision to launch and invasion that has cost thousands of Russian and Ukrainian deaths.
One call came in early 2024, according to the Post, which also obtained the book. It reported Trump ordered an aide away from his Mar-a-Lago office for the call with Putin.
The report comes days after the New York Times reported on Trump’s 2017 meeting with Putin in Hamburg, their first face-to-face encounter.
Putin, whose forces had already seized Crimea, told Trump Ukraine ‘was a corrupt, fabricated country.’ Trump told him was considering sending weapons to Ukraine, according to the Times.
Taking a test: Putin advised Trump not to tell people he had sent Covid tests to him early in the pandemic because people might get mad at him
Trump vouched for his relationship with Putin during his September meeting with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky
‘What do you think?’ Trump asked him, in a meeting that apparently rattled former Secretary of State Rex Tillerson. ‘We’ve got work to do to change the president’s mind on Ukraine,’ Tillerson told aides when the meeting concluded.
Woodward’s book paints a contrasting picture of President Joe Biden, whose administration has steered billions in sophisticated weaponry to Kiev.
‘That f****** Putin,’ Biden told advisors following the invation. ‘Putin is evil. We are dealing with the epitome of evil,’ he said.
Trump last month stood side by side with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky and said he would bring an end to the bloody conflict. He has criticized U.S. funding for Ukraine, and his efforts to get Zelensky to probe the Bidens was featured in Trump’s first impeachment.
‘I also have a very good relationship as you know with President Putin and I think if we win [the election] we’re going to get it resolved very quickly,’ Trump said.
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