By Eric Tucker | Related Press
WASHINGTON — A brand new ebook’s assertion that former President Donald Trump could have had as many as seven personal telephone calls with Russian President Vladimir Putin since leaving the White Home has refocused consideration on their politically fraught relationship and on Trump’s sustained dialogue with world leaders as he seeks a return to energy.
It’s not shocking in and of itself that an ex-president would protect ties with overseas counterparts. However the element in journalist Bob Woodward’s ebook “War” raised eyebrows in mild of a particular counsel investigation throughout Trump’s presidency that examined potential ties between Russia and the Republican’s 2016 marketing campaign in addition to Trump’s more moderen criticism of U.S. support to Ukraine because it fends off Russia’s invasion — statements which have hinted at a potential U.S. coverage overhaul if he’s elected.
“I would caution any world leader about trusting Vladimir Putin with anything,” mentioned Emily Harding, who led the Senate Intelligence Committee’s investigation into 2016 Russian election interference and is now a nationwide safety knowledgeable on the Heart for Strategic and Worldwide Research.
Each Trump marketing campaign and the Kremlin, which U.S. officers have mentioned is working to affect the 2024 election in favor of Trump, denied the reporting.
Requested at a press briefing Wednesday, White Home press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre mentioned the administration would have “serious concerns” if the reported calls had been true.
“We’re not aware of those calls. I certainly can’t confirm any of those calls from here,” she mentioned. “But, if it is indeed true, are we (concerned)? Do we have serious concerns? Yes.”
It’s no secret that Trump has held a number of conferences over the past 12 months with main world leaders: internet hosting Hungary’s nationalist prime minister, Viktor Orban, and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, sitting down in New York final April with Polish President Andrzej Duda and assembly Volodymyr Zelenskyy in the course of the Ukrainian president’s journey to the U.S. final month.
The conferences provide Trump a chance to distinguish his overseas coverage strategy from that of President Joe Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris, the Democratic presidential nominee, and to shore up connections if he reclaims the White Home. Throughout Netanyahu’s go to in July, Trump boasted of a “great relationship,” drawing a tacit distinction with the extra strained dynamic between the Israeli chief and Biden.
Whereas these conferences had been identified publicly, Woodward’s ebook cites an unnamed aide as saying Trump and Putin had as many as seven personal calls. That provides to long-running questions on their relationship and what Trump could also be attempting to realize, mentioned Robert Orttung, a professor of worldwide affairs at George Washington College.
As president, “We never really understood why he liked Putin so much and why he was trying to develop such a close relationship with someone who is clearly an adversary and against everything the United States stands for,” Orttung mentioned.
Some claims about ties between Trump and allies and Russia have proved overheated or fizzled over time, however the topic continues to attract appreciable public scrutiny, together with after Trump left workplace.
The FBI and particular counsel Robert Mueller spent a number of years investigating whether or not Russia had colluded with the 2016 Trump marketing campaign to tip the result of the election. Although investigators didn’t set up a felony conspiracy, they did discover the Trump marketing campaign actively welcomed Russia’s assist in the course of the election and that the Russian authorities perceived it might profit from a Trump presidency.
In 2018, after assembly Putin in Helsinki, Trump memorably and publicly questioned his personal intelligence companies ‘ conclusion that Russia meddled in the election.
“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 at the time. He added: “He just said it’s not Russia. I’ll say this: I don’t see any motive why it might be.”
Extra just lately, Trump known as Putin “pretty smart” for invading Ukraine and has praised Russia’s navy document in historic conflicts, saying final month: “As somebody told me the other day, they beat Hitler, they beat Napoleon. That’s what they do. They fight. And it’s not pleasant.”
The ebook, which additionally says Trump secretly despatched Putin COVID-19 check machines in the course of the top of the pandemic, doesn’t describe the content material of their conversations.
Trump marketing campaign spokesman Steven Cheung denied they occurred, calling the ebook by the famed Watergate journalist the “work of a truly demented and deranged man who suffers from a debilitating case of Trump Derangement Syndrome.” Trump complained at a marketing campaign occasion on Wednesday that “I had to go through years of Russia, Russia, Russia, and they knew it was fake.”
A Kremlin spokesman additionally denied the calls occurred.
The ebook’s particulars revived dialogue in regards to the Logan Act, a 1799 statute that bars personal Americans from attempting to intervene in “disputes or controversies” between the USA and overseas powers with out authorities approval.
The statute has produced simply two felony instances, none because the 1850s and neither leading to a felony conviction. Former presidents from Richard Nixon to Jimmy Carter to Invoice Clinton have held talks with worldwide figures after leaving the White Home.
“Trump could be technically liable just as I think dozens of prominent figures have been technically liable,” mentioned Daniel Rice, a College of Arkansas legislation professor and constitutional legislation knowledgeable.
Among the many potential causes for the legislation’s dormancy, Rice mentioned, is a disinclination by prosecutors to “turn violators into martyrs” or to be seen as focusing on a sitting president’s political adversaries.
Trump himself was briefed by then-White Home counsel Don McGahn in regards to the Logan Act following a well-publicized episode involving his first nationwide safety adviser. In a telephone name in the course of the presidential transition interval in 2016, Michael Flynn urged Russia’s ambassador to the U.S. to be “even-keeled” in response to Obama administration penalties imposed for election interference and warranted him that “we can have a better conversation” after Trump grew to become president.
Flynn was interviewed by the FBI about that dialog and pleaded responsible to mendacity to brokers about it, although Trump pardoned Flynn within the remaining weeks of his presidency.
Trump later known as for former Secretary of State John Kerry to be prosecuted for violating the Logan Act over his conversations with Iran after he left the Obama administration. Kerry was by no means charged.
Related Press author Will Weissert in Washington contributed.
