New revelations
Updated on October 8, 2024, 10:01 p.m
Russian President Vladimir Putin is said to have advised Donald Trump not to make the secret corona tests public. © dpa / Kristina Kormilitsyna/Pool Sputnik Kremlin/AP/dpa
As US President, Trump secretly sent corona tests to Russian President Putin and since leaving office he has had several conversations with Putin – this emerges from the new book by journalist Bob Woodward.
New findings from US journalist Bob Woodward about Donald Trump’s contacts in Moscow: As US President, the Republican secretly sent corona tests to Russian President Vladimir Putin despite the shortage in his own country, and after his time in the White House, he sent them with them had several conversations with the Kremlin boss – this emerges from Woodward’s new book “War”, excerpts from which the “Washington Post” published on Tuesday. In it, the investigative journalist also reports on the difficult relationship between US President Joe Biden and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.
According to Woodward’s research, Trump continues to maintain personal contacts with Putin, despite the two-and-a-half-year war in Ukraine and despite his candidacy for the presidential election on November 5th. When the corona pandemic raged in 2020 and tests were urgently needed everywhere, Trump sent a load of corona tests to the Russian president.
Putin accepted, but advised Trump to keep the delivery secret: “I don’t want you to tell anyone, because then people will be angry with you, not with me,” Putin said to Trump, according to the book.
Kamala Harris stunned
Democratic presidential candidate Kamala Harris said in a radio interview on Tuesday that everyone in the USA was worried about corona tests at the time. “And this guy is sending them to Russia to a murderous dictator for his personal use?” This is just the “latest blatant example of who Trump is.”
Woodward quotes an unnamed Trump aide saying he has spoken to Putin up to seven times since the end of his term in 2021. At the beginning of 2024, Trump asked an employee at his Mar-a-Lago property in Florida to leave his office so that he could have a private phone call with Putin.
Book release of “War” shortly before the election
“War” will be released in the USA on October 15th, three weeks before the election on November 5th, in which former President Trump for the Republican Party and Vice President Harris for the Democratic Party will compete against each other.
Woodward has been reporting on various US presidents for 50 years. In the 1970s, he and his “Washington Post” colleague Carl Bernstein became world famous through their research into the Watergate wiretapping scandal surrounding President Richard Nixon. Since then, he has repeatedly published investigative books about US presidents, including several about Trump.
Woodward comes to the conclusion that the right-wing populist is less suitable for the presidency than Nixon was at the time, given his contacts with an authoritarian Russian leader who is waging a war against US ally Ukraine. “Trump was the most reckless and impulsive president in American history and is exhibiting the same character as the 2024 presidential candidate,” Woodward writes.
Trump team calls author ‘crazy and deranged’
The Trump team described the book as “trash” and spoke of “made-up stories.” Woodward is a “crazy and disturbed man,” said Trump campaign spokesman Steven Cheung.
In his book, Woodward also deals with incumbent Biden and his difficult relationship with Netanyahu. Biden called the Israeli prime minister a “liar,” reports Woodward, who also quotes from a phone conversation between the two politicians in April: “What’s your strategy, man?” Biden then asked the Israeli head of government. “We have to go into Rafah,” he said, referring to the city in the south of the Gaza Strip. Biden then said: “Bibi, you have no strategy.”
White House Deputy Press Secretary Emilie Simons said Biden and Netanyahu have known each other for a long time. “They have a very sincere and direct relationship,” Simon said. She didn’t want to comment on specific anecdotes. (AFP/edited by cgo)
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