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WOODWARD: TRUMP SPOKE TO PUTIN AT LEAST 7 TIMES SINCE LEAVING OFFICE

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Formal President Donald Trump has spoken to Russian President Vladimir Putin at least 7 times, Bob Woodward has revealed in his upcoming book “War.” And so Trump breaks another norm: Presidents don’t talk to declared enemies of the United States after U.S. presidents leave office.

In addition, Woodward reports that at a time when many Americans could not get Covid tests, Trump secretly sent Putin Covid test machines that Putin could use to test himself.The New York Times:
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.

The Trump campaign and the Kremlin have denied the charges.

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.

[…]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.

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