Trump Secretly Stayed in Touch With Putin After Leaving Office, Book Says
A new book by the journalist Bob Woodward also reports that Donald J. Trump, while still in office, secretly sent Vladimir Putin what were then rare Covid-19 tests for the Russian leader’s personal use.
Reporting from Washington
Former President Donald J. Trump has secretly spoken with President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia as many as seven times since leaving office, even as he was pressuring Republicans to block military aid to Ukraine to fight Russian invaders, according to a new book by the journalist Bob Woodward.
The book, titled “War” and scheduled to be published next week, describes a scene in early 2024 at Mar-a-Lago, Mr. Trump’s estate in Florida, when the former president ordered an aide out of his office so he could conduct a phone call with Mr. Putin. The unidentified aide said the two might have spoken a half-dozen other times since Mr. Trump left the White House.
The book also reports that Mr. Trump, while still in office early during the Covid-19 pandemic in 2020, secretly sent Mr. Putin what were then rare Abbott Point of Care test machines for the Russian’s personal use. Mr. Putin, who has been described as particularly anxious about being infected at the time, urged Mr. Trump to not publicly reveal the gesture because it could damage the American president politically. “I don’t want you to tell anybody because people will get mad at you, not me,” Mr. Putin reportedly told him.
The disclosures raise new questions about Mr. Trump’s relationship with Mr. Putin just weeks before an election that will determine whether the former president will reclaim the White House. A copy of the book was obtained by The New York Times. The Washington Post, where Mr. Woodward has worked for more than half a century, and CNN, where he often appears as a commentator, also reported on the book on Tuesday.
Mr. Woodward, who rose to fame with his Watergate reporting and regularly produces best-selling books with explosive reporting based on access to high-level sources, attributed his account of the continuing communications between Mr. Trump and Mr. Putin to a single Trump aide who is not named in the book. The aide offered no specific details beyond saying there had been what Mr. Woodward characterized as “maybe as many as seven” contacts. There was no immediate independent confirmation on Tuesday.
Mr. Trump’s campaign dismissed Mr. Woodward’s book by assailing the author with typically personal insults — “a total sleazebag” who is “slow, lethargic, incompetent and overall a boring person with no personality” — without addressing any of the specifics reported in it.
“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,” Steven Cheung, the campaign communications director, said in the statement. Mr. Cheung said Mr. Trump did not give Mr. Woodward access for the book and noted that the former president was suing the author over a previous book.
The Kremlin likewise denied the reporting in Mr. Woodward’s book about conversations between Mr. Trump and Mr. Putin and the provision of Covid tests. “This is not true,” Dmitri Peskov, a spokesman, said in a text message. “It’s a typical bogus story in the context of the pre-election political campaign.”
While generally disputing Mr. Woodward’s account, the Trump campaign statement did not explicitly say whether the former president had spoken with Mr. Putin since leaving office and the campaign did not immediately respond to a question about that. But Mr. Trump’s oft-expressed affinity for the master of the Kremlin has long baffled even his own appointees, prompted investigations and troubled Republican national security specialists.
U.S. intelligence agencies concluded that Mr. Putin had ordered the Russian government to intervene in the 2016 election to help Mr. Trump beat former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, a conclusion that Mr. Trump rejected, suggesting that he believed Mr. Putin’s denial. While the special counsel Robert S. Mueller III did not find a criminal conspiracy that could be proved in court, he documented an unusual number of contacts between Russia and people in Mr. Trump’s circle during that campaign.
Since leaving office, Mr. Trump has continued to praise Mr. Putin. He called the Russian leader a “genius” when Moscow invaded Ukraine in 2022 and since then has refused to say that Ukraine should win the war. He has criticized American aid to Ukraine and leaned on congressional Republicans not to approve more assistance. He has boasted that if he wins he will negotiate an end to the war in Ukraine within 24 hours and do so even before the inauguration.
Mr. Trump has not explained how he would do that, but possible terms described last month by his running mate, Senator JD Vance of Ohio, sounded a lot like what Mr. Putin would want. Mr. Vance said that Russia could keep the Ukrainian territory it has seized by force in violation of international law and receive a “guarantee of neutrality” from Ukraine, which would not be allowed to join NATO.
Vice President Kamala Harris, in an interview on “60 Minutes” on Monday night, criticized Mr. Trump’s ties with Mr. Putin. “Right now, we are supporting Ukraine’s ability to defend itself against Russia’s unprovoked aggression,” she said. “Donald Trump, if he were president, Putin would be sitting in Kyiv right now. He talks about, ‘Oh, he can end it on day one.’ You know what that is? It’s about surrender.”
Mr. Woodward’s book does not report what Mr. Trump and Mr. Putin discussed in the call in early 2024, nor does it provide details about the additional calls mentioned by the Trump aide. It quotes Jason Miller, a top campaign aide to Mr. Trump, saying that he had “not heard that they’re talking, so I’d push back on that.” But Mr. Miller also said that “I’m sure they’d know how to get in touch with each other” if they did want to talk.
Avril D. Haines, the director of national intelligence appointed by President Biden, hedged on the question when asked by Mr. Woodward. “I would not purport to be aware of all contacts with Putin,” she told him. “I wouldn’t purport to speak to what President Trump may or may not have done.”
Former presidents meet with foreign counterparts after leaving office from time to time. In fact, Mr. Trump has hosted Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of Israel, Prime Minister Viktor Orban of Hungary and others at Mar-a-Lago. But those meetings were publicly known, and Mr. Trump posed for pictures with his guests.
It would be highly unusual for a former president to privately talk with a top American adversary like Mr. Putin without clearing it with the current administration — especially at a time when the United States and Russia are on opposite sides of a war in Europe. Mr. Biden has not spoken with Mr. Putin since the invasion of Ukraine.
Peter Baker is the chief White House correspondent for The Times. He has covered the last five presidents and sometimes writes analytical pieces that place presidents and their administrations in a larger context and historical framework. More about Peter Baker
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