Opinion

The Kremlin Throws Trump Under the Bus on Secret Putin Gift

Hafiz Rashid
Wed, October 9, 2024 



Donald Trump denies sending Vladimir Putin Covid-19 tests during the height of the pandemic. But Putin himself says it’s all true.


On Wednesday, Kremlin spokesperson Dimitry Peskov confirmed journalist Bob Woodward’s account from his upcoming book, War, that Trump sent the tests, but denied Woodward’s claim that the two had spoken multiple times since Trump left office in 2021.

“We also sent equipment at the beginning of the pandemic,” Peskov said in a written response to questions from Bloomberg about the book. “But about the phone calls—it’s not true.”


Trump reportedly sent the tests to Putin amid a shortage of tests in the United States, and Putin told him to keep it a secret for fear of a backlash against Trump from the American public.


“I don’t want you to tell anybody because people will get mad at you, not me,” Putin reportedly said to Trump at the time.


Trump’s campaign vehemently denied the report Tuesday, calling Woodward a “total sleazebag,” “an angry, little man,” “a truly demented and deranged man,” and “a boring person with no personality.”

“President Trump gave him absolutely no access for this trash book that either belongs in the bargain bin of the fiction section of a discount bookstore or used as toilet tissue,” said Steven Cheung, the Trump campaign’s communications director, in a statement.


Kamala Harris and her campaign seized on the report.


“That is just the most recent, stark example of who Donald Trump is,” Harris said Tuesday to talk show host Howard Stern.

People were “scrambling to get these kits,” Harris said. “And this guy who is president of the United States is sending them to Russia, to a murderous dictator, for his personal use?”


Biden also attacked Trump for the same thing at a fundraiser in Pennsylvania Tuesday.


“Those tests to tell you whether you had Covid were in short supply, so he called his good friend, Putin, not a joke, to make sure he had the tests,” Biden said. “What’s wrong with this guy?”

Trump said at a press conference last month that Ukraine should surrender to Russia and make things “much better,” almost admitting that if he is elected president again, he plans to give Putin whatever he wants. He’s also said that wants to “use sanctions as little as possible” against countries like Russia, Iran, and China.

Kremlin Says Trump Sent Putin Covid Tests While President

Bloomberg News
Wed, October 9, 2024 



(Bloomberg) -- The Kremlin confirmed that former US President Donald Trump while in office sent Russian President Vladimir Putin Covid-19 testing devices during the height of the pandemic, as recounted in a new book by journalist Bob Woodward.

Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said on Wednesday that the tests had been sent, but denied the book’s claim that the two leaders had spoken by phone several times since Trump left office.

“We also sent equipment at the beginning of the pandemic,” Peskov said in a written response when asked about the book. “But about the phone calls — it’s not true.”

The book from the renowned journalist of Watergate fame reports that Trump, while president in 2020, secretly sent Abbott Covid testing machines to Putin when the devices were scarce, according to CNN.

In a statement earlier Tuesday, the Trump campaign pushed back on the allegations, saying “none of these made up stories by Bob Woodward are true” and accusing the journalist of bias.

“President Trump gave him absolutely no access for this trash book that either belongs in the bargain bin of the fiction section of a discount bookstore or used as toilet tissue,” Steven Cheung, the Trump campaign’s communications director, wrote in a statement.

US Vice President and Democratic presidential candidate Kamala Harris sought to capitalize on the book’s reporting.

“That is just the most recent, stark example of who Donald Trump is,” Harris said Tuesday in an interview on The Howard Stern Show.

The vice president said people were “scrambling to get these kits” during the pandemic, adding, “And this guy who is president of the United States is sending them to Russia, to a murderous dictator, for his personal use?”

“I believe that Donald Trump has this desire to be a dictator,” Harris said. “He admires strong men, and he gets played by them because he thinks that they’re his friends and they are manipulating him full-time, and manipulating him by flattery and with favor.”

President Joe Biden also criticized Trump over the report during a fundraiser for Democratic Senator Bob Casey of Pennsylvania on Tuesday evening.

“Those tests to tell you whether you had Covid were in short supply, so he called his good friend, Putin, not a joke, to make sure he had the tests,” Biden said. “What’s wrong with this guy?”

Trump’s relationship with Putin has become a target for Democrats, including Harris and Biden, looking to cast the Republican presidential nominee as too cozy with dictators and jeopardizing the security of the US and its allies.

Trump has long boasted about his relationship with Putin, including by claiming that he could broker an end to Russia’s war on Ukraine if he’s elected again to the White House, without detailing how he would accomplish that.

The former president has assailed Biden over Russia’s 2022 invasion of Ukraine and Israel’s war with Hamas in the Middle East, saying they would not have happened if the Republican was still in office.

Trump Secretly Gave Putin Covid Tests During Shortage, Book Says

Ryan Bort

HOLLYWOOD REPORTER
Tue, October 8, 2024


Donald Trump’s political persona is based around putting the United States first. The pitch, as with just about everything the former president claims he stands for, comes with a few caveats. Journalist Bob Woodward writes in his new book War, for instance, that Trump secretly sent Russian President Vladimir Putin Covid-19 tests while the U.S. was facing a shortage in 2020.

Woodward, the legendary Washington Post reporter who helped break open the Watergate scandal, writes that Putin even warned Trump not to tell anyone about the delivery, which was intended for Putin’s personal use, “because people will get mad at you, not me.”

That’s not all.

Woodward also writes that Trump has secretly communicated with Putin as many as seven times since leaving office in 2021, describing an instance earlier this year when Trump sent an aide out of his office at Mar-a-Lago so he could talk with the Russian autocrat. The calls are concerning for several reasons, not least of which is that Trump has repeatedly defended Putin’s incursion into Ukraine while pushing Republicans to fight against sending aid to Ukraine.

Trump’s campaign has denied Woodward’s reporting. “None of these made up stories by Bob Woodward are true and are the work of a truly demented man who suffers from a debilitating case of Trump Derangement Syndrome,” campaign spokesperson Steven Cheung said in a statement, adding that Woodward is an “angry, little man,” a “sleazebag,” “lethargic,” “incompetent,” and “overall a boring person with no personality.”

Kamala Harris responded later on Tuesday during an interview with Howard Stern. “Trump admires strongmen and gets played them because he thinks that they’re his friends, and they are manipulating him by flattery and with favor,” she said, emphasizing that “in the height of the pandemic … people were dying by the hundreds, everybody was scrambling to get the Covid test kits, and this guy who was president of the United States is sending them to Russia, to a murderous dictator, for his personal use.”

Trump has been criticized for his cozy relationship with Putin since he took office, and has long spoken glowingly about the Russian president.

When asked in 2018 whether he believed the U.S. intelligence community’s assessment that Russia had meddled in the 2016 election or Putin’s denial that he had interfered, Trump suggested he believed Putin. “I have great confidence in my intelligence people, but I will tell you that President Putin was extremely strong and powerful in his denial today,” Trump said.

Trump has since defended Putin’s war on Ukraine, an American ally. He called Putin a “genius” as he first attacked Ukraine in 2022, while repeatedly claiming the attack would have never happened if Trump were still president. “I actually had a very good relationship with Putin,” he said last year.

Putin is a former KGB agent, and many, including former Trump national security adviser H.R. McMaster, believe the Russian president is exploiting Trump. McMaster wrote in a recently released book that Putin “played to Trump’s ego and insecurities with flattery.”

“[Putin] knew really what Trump’s predilections were,” McMaster told CBS News in August. “One of my roles was to alert him to that — to say, ‘Mr. President, you know, this guy is the best liar in the world.’”



Kamala Harris Addresses Reports That Trump Sent Putin Covid Tests During Stephen Colbert Interview

Zoe G. Phillips
Tue, October 8, 2024 



Vice President Kamala Harris addressed new reports of Donald Trump’s relationship with Vladimir Putin during her appearance on Tuesday’s episode of The Late Show With Stephen Colbert.

In journalist Bob Woodward’s new book, released Tuesday, an unnamed aide reported that Trump has spoken with Putin as many as seven times since leaving the White House. Other claims included information about Trump sending Putin COVID-19 tests while he was in office, at the height of the pandemic.

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Harris acknowledged on Tuesday that she hasn’t read the book yet, but said, “Donald Trump — he openly admires dictators and authoritarians. He has said he wants to be a dictator on day one, if he were elected again as president. He gets played by these guys. He admires so-called strongmen, and he gets played because they flatter him or offer him favor.”

She also addressed the COVID tests reports directly. “I ask everyone here and everyone who is watching: Do you remember what those days were like? You remember how many people did not have tests and were trying to scramble to get them?”

She became angry as she continued speaking about her opponent’s connection to Russia, saying. “The commander-in-chief of the United States of America must stand strong and defend the principles that we hold dear. We should stand with our allies. We should strengthen the alliances that we have, such as NATO, which is the strongest military alliance the world has ever seen. We must stand with our friend Ukraine where Russia is attempting to change borders by force.”

Harris added, “And this man is giving COVID test kits to Vladimir Putin? Think about what this means on top of him sending love letters to Kim Jong Un. … He thinks, well, that’s his friend. What about the American people? They should be your first friend.”

Elsewhere in the interview, Colbert asked the Democratic nominee about Hurricane Helene, which recently ravaged North Carolina, and Hurricane Milton, a severe storm headed for Florida. Harris urged people to listen to local officials and criticized politicians who “tell lies” for political gain.

“It’s crude,” she said. “Have you no empathy, man, for the suffering of other people? Have you have no sense of purpose if you purport to be a leader?”

Regarding the Israel-Hamas war, Harris addressed her statement that she and President Biden are close to a ceasefire deal. “Close means that a lot of the details have been worked out but details remain,” she said. “And so there has been some progress, but it is meaningless unless a deal is actually reached, so I don’t want to suggest to you that we should be applauded for getting close at times to a deal.”

The VP also spoke about her debate performance and weighed in on the viral picture of herself with her chin resting on her hand. When Colbert asked her what she was thinking in that moment, she replied, “It’s family TV, right? It starts with a ‘w,’ there’s a letter between it, then the last letter’s ‘f’.”

Together with the late night host, Harris also opened a can of Miller High Life and said, “The last time I had beer was at a baseball game with Doug [Emhoff].”

Shortly after opening the drink, Harris said of her running mate, “He lost millions of jobs. He lost manufacturing. You lost automotive plants, you lost the election. What does that make you? A loser. This is what somebody at my rallies said. I thought it was funny.”

She then quipped, “This is what happens when I drink beer.”

About the whirlwind campaign which only began in July following Joe Biden’s withdrawal, Harris said, “There’s a lot of catching up to do. My opponent, the former president, has been running since 2020 … People are exhausted by that old tired playbook of Donald Trump’s … Folks are ready to turn the page.”

Best of The Hollywood Reporter



Trump disputes report that, as president, he secretly sent Putin COVID-19 testing kit

JONATHAN KARL, KELSEY WALSH, SOO RIN KIM and LALEE IBSSA
Tue, October 8, 2024 
Former President Donald Trump is disputing a report that he has had "as many as seven" phone calls with Russian President Vladimir Putin since he left the White House, and that, back when he was in office, Trump secretly sent Putin a COVID-19 testing kit for his personal use.

Journalist Bob Woodward wrote about the alleged interactions between Trump and Putin in his soon-to-be released book, titled "War," according to the Washington Post and CNN.

Woodward reportedly cited an anonymous Trump aide as the source for his reporting regarding Trump maintaining contact with Putin after leaving the White House.

MORE: As Trump pushes false FEMA claims, officials warn of 'extremely damaging' impacts

In the book, Woodward reportedly wrote that Trump sent a COVID-19 testing kit to Putin at a point in the pandemic when tests were in short supply -- and that, after Putin received the kit, he told Trump, "I don't want you to tell anybody because people will get mad at you, not me."

Trump told ABC News Chief Washington Correspondent Jonathan Karl that neither happened.

"That's false," Trump said of Woodward's report that he had spoken with Putin after leaving office, and that he had earlier sent Putin a COVID test.

PHOTO: Republican presidential nominee and former U.S. President Donald Trump delivers remarks in Milwaukee, Oct. 1, 2024. (Carlos Barria/Reuters)

"He's a storyteller. A bad one. And he's lost his marbles," Trump said of Woodward.

Trump campaign spokesperson Steven Cheung categorically denied Woodward's accounts, calling them "made-up stories" and stressing that Trump did not provide any "access" to Woodward for the book.

"None of these made-up stories by Bob Woodward are true and are the work of a truly demented and deranged man who suffers from a debilitating case of Trump Derangement Syndrome," Cheung said in a statement.

"President Trump gave him absolutely no access for this trash book," Cheung said.

Trump secretly gave Putin Covid test machines, Bob Woodward book says

Martin Pengelly in Washington
Tue, October 8, 2024 

President Donald Trump, left, and President Vladimir Putin of Russia shake hands at the beginning of a meeting in Helsinki, Finland, on 16 July 2018.Photograph: Pablo Martínez Monsiváis/AP


Donald Trump secretly sent Covid-19 testing machines to Vladimir Putin in the early stages of the pandemic when such resources were in short supply, the veteran reporter Bob Woodward reveals in an eagerly awaited new book.

Related: Trump took ‘British naval secrets’ to Mar-a-Lago, says Christopher Steele

According to Woodward, Trump “secretly sent Putin a bunch of Abbott Point of Care Covid test machines for his personal use”.

In response, the Russian president told his US counterpart: “I don’t want you to tell anybody because people will get mad at you.”

Remarkably, Woodward also reports that the relationship between the two men, hugely controversial during Trump’s first presidential campaign and subsequent four years in the White House, has continued since Trump has been out of power, through as many as seven private calls.

The revelations were among many published by US outlets on Tuesday, among them dramatic scenes of Joe Biden warning Putin not to use nuclear weapons in Ukraine and new reporting about how Biden was this summer convinced to step aside as the Democratic nominee for president, clearing the way for the vice-president, Kamala Harris, to challenge Trump in November.

Now 81 – the same age as Biden – Woodward has been a Washington institution since the 1970s, when his work with Carl Bernstein on the Watergate scandal led to Richard Nixon’s resignation as president. Following three scoop-filled books on Trump’s presidency – Fear, Rage and Peril, the last co-written with Robert Costa – Woodward’s new book, War, considers key events under Biden including the Russian war in Ukraine, Israel’s war against Hamas, and political battles at home. It will be published next week.

Excerpts were released by Woodward’s two employers, the Washington Post and CNN.

Though the US and Russia did share medical equipment such as ventilators in the early stages of the pandemic, Trump’s decision to send Putin Covid testing machines would probably have proved hugely controversial if known.

Apparently recognizing this, Putin reportedly told Trump: “Please don’t tell anybody you sent these to me.”

Trump said: “I don’t care. Fine.”

Putin was said to have replied: “No, no. I don’t want you to tell anybody because people will get mad at you, not me. They don’t care about me.”

Trump lost the White House later in 2020 but, remarkably, Woodward says calls between the two men have continued. Earlier this year, Woodward writes, Trump ordered an aide to leave his office at Mar-a-Lago in Florida, so he could hold a private call with Putin.

Worries persist about Putin’s influence on Trump. Robert Mueller, the former FBI director who investigated links between Trump and Moscow around the 2016 election, concluding that Putin sought to help Trump defeat Hillary Clinton, recently said Russia would interfere again this year.

According to the Post, Woodward reports that Jason Miller, a close Trump adviser, responded hesitantly when asked about Trump and Putin’s continuing calls.

“Um, ah, not that, ah, not that I’m aware of,” Miller reportedly said, adding: “I have not heard that they’re talking, so I’d push back on that.”

Woodward adds that Avril Haines, Biden’s director of national intelligence, “carefully hedged”, saying: “I would not purport to be aware of all contacts with Putin. I wouldn’t purport to speak to what President Trump may or may not have done.”

On Tuesday, Steven Cheung, Trump’s communications director, said: “None of these made-up stories by Bob Woodward are true and are the work of a truly demented and deranged man … clearly upset because President Trump is successfully suing him because of the unauthorized publishing of recordings he made previously.”

That lawsuit concerns tapes of calls that Woodward released in 2022 and over which Trump sued the following year. Woodward has sought to have the suit dismissed.

Drama around Woodward’s new book comes less than a month from the 5 November presidential election, when Trump could be returned to office. According to Axios, which cited sources who had seen Woodward’s book, Woodward describes a 4 July White House lunch at which Antony Blinken, Biden’s secretary of state, discussed with the president whether he should withdraw, given concerns about his age and fitness.

Three weeks later, Biden withdrew, a historic decision that has placed a spotlight on Trump’s own age, 78, and mental state. In Woodward’s judgment, according to the Post, “Trump was the most reckless and impulsive president in American history and is demonstrating the very same character as a presidential candidate in 2024.”

And yet Trump and Harris remain locked in a tight race, notwithstanding Trump’s two impeachments, one for inciting the deadly January 6 attack on Congress; his conviction on 34 criminal charges concerning hush-money payments; his other ongoing criminal cases, over election subversion and retention of classified information; multimillion-dollar civil penalties in cases including a defamation suit arising from a rape claim a judge deemed “substantially true”; and proliferating other scandals.

Elsewhere, Woodward’s book reportedly captures Biden’s candid responses to foreign policy challenges.

The president is reportedly depicted calling Benjamin Netanyahu, the rightwing Israeli prime minister who has resisted US attempts to secure a ceasefire with Hamas, “That son of a bitch” and “a bad fucking guy!”

“That fucking Putin,” Biden reportedly said about the Russian president. “Putin is evil. We are dealing with the epitome of evil.”

Russian aggression against Ukraine began when Barack Obama was US president. According to Woodward, Biden believes the man under whom he was vice-president between 2009 and 2017 “never took Putin seriously” – a point of view familiar from reports of tensions between the two men.

“They fucked up in 2014” when Russia invaded Crimea, Biden told a friend, according to Woodward. “That’s why we are here. We fucked it up. Barack never took Putin seriously. We did nothing. We gave Putin a license to continue! Well, I’m revoking his fucking license!”

According to CNN, Woodward reports that in October 2021, US intelligence including material from a precious human source inside the Kremlin “conclusively” showed that Putin planned to invade Ukraine. Biden reportedly told Bill Burns, the CIA director: “Jesus Christ! Now I’ve got to deal with Russia swallowing Ukraine?”

According to Woodward, Biden confronted Putin twice that December, on a video conference and then a “hot 50-minute call” in which Putin “raised the risk of nuclear war in a threatening way” and Biden told him “it’s impossible to win” such a conflict.

Woodward also reports an October 2022 conversation between Lloyd Austin, the US secretary of defense, and his Russian counterpart, Sergei Shoigu, about possible use of nuclear weapons.

“If you did this, all the restraints that we have been operating under in Ukraine would be reconsidered,” Austin reportedly said. “This would isolate Russia on the world stage to a degree you Russians cannot fully appreciate.”

Shoigu said: “I don’t take kindly to being threatened.”

Austin said: “Mr Minister, I am the leader of the most powerful military in the history of the world. I don’t make threats.”

In another call two days later, Woodward reports, Shoigu claimed Ukraine was planning to use a “dirty bomb”, a claim the US deemed false but meant to justify a Russian nuclear strike.

“We don’t believe you,” Austin reportedly said. “We don’t see any indications of this, and the world will see through this. Don’t do it.”

“I understand,” Shoigu replied.

Colin Kahl, a senior Pentagon official, tells Woodward: “It was probably the most hair-raising moment of the whole war.”

Woodward also reports that the US struggled to convince Volodymyr Zelenskyy, the president of Ukraine, that Russia would actually invade. At the Munich Security Conference in February 2022, Harris reportedly told Zelenskyy to “start thinking about things like having a succession plan in place … if you are captured or killed or cannot govern”, then left Germany thinking she might not see Zelenskyy again.

Russia invaded that month. Two and a half years later, the war drags on, Zelenskyy defiant in Kyiv. Democrats, however, warn that given Trump’s close ties to Putin, a second Trump presidency would have dire consequences for Ukraine and its allies.