"... 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.'... 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.... saying [it] would not have happened if the Republican was still in office."
From
"Kremlin Says Trump Sent Putin Covid Tests While President/Kremlin denies phone calls took place after Trump left office/Trump campaign pushed back on claims in Bob Woodward’s book" (Bloomberg).
No one can know what would have happened if Trump had remained President, but was there something obviously wrong with sending these Covid tests? I'm not seeing it.
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74 comments:
like small pox blankets to indians?
Have you seen a COVID testing device? To the average blue state soyqueer those things were holy objects, so it's treason for the President to send even one out. Apparently BoJo was planning to send James Bond and the Delta Force to attack the Netherlands over their vaccines?
The fact blue staters have hit this rhetorical bottom means they are more desperate than I ever imagined. I don't doubt that Blinken and Yellen are looking into aliyah before it's too late.
It sounds like Russia sent us tests, too. What's wrong with countries working together to solve a worldwide pandemic?
Sending the tests, in retrospect (retrospect for most people, not me), is almost an act of war. The use of the PCR tests outside of medical settings was an enormous waste of money and time, and an argument can be made they were a waste in medical settings and might have driven overuse some of the very most deadly hospital treatments such as sedation and intubation as a way to minimize virus in the air.
Ugh, apparently the previous version of soytoy didn't get approved by Google. Fine. While the blue staters think it's treason to send Covid tests to Putin- to the point BoJo was getting ready to send James Bond and the SAS to raid the vaccine supply of the Netherlands- the level of desperation is truly palpable now.
“They fucked up in 2014. That’s why we are here. We fucked it up. Barack never took Putin seriously.”
—— Joe Biden
https://legalinsurrection.com/2024/10/biden-reportedly-blames-obama-for-putin-invading-ukraine-in-2022/
How many tests? And what kind? I am assuming nasal swab but does the story say?
If it was a dozen, or even a hundred, so what. A c heap price to buy some goodwill.
If it was a million, AND we really needed them, then yeah, there might be a problem with that.
Did we have a problem with availability of the tests? I was getting tested 2-3 times a month during kung flu due to client requirements. I'd go to Walgreens.com, sign up for an appointment, get tested.
I don't remember ever waiting more than a day or two for an appointment or more than a couple cars in line. Even at the height of the kung flu.
Smells like bullshit to me.
Never forget that Woodward has been employed as a CIA asset since the 60's when he was in Naval Intelligence. Bear that in mind when reading any of his stories. As in bear in mind that mostly what he writes are "stories".
John Henry
John Henry
Even if true - so what?
Russia had not invaded Ukraine, and Obama never thought Russia was a problem.
Probably to fuck with him. Putin would be confused by it, but intrigued.
Russians are always afraid that everything is a CIA plot. And Russian scientists have been known to make "cures" that don't work because that's how soviet systems work (see modern medical schools in USA for recent examples).
“They fucked up in 2014. That’s why we are here. We fucked it up. Barack never took Putin seriously.”
—— Joe Biden
https://legalinsurrection.com/2024/10/biden-reportedly-blames-obama-for-putin-invading-ukraine-in-2022/
Old Joe still has some sense left. Not much, but some.
was there something obviously wrong with sending these Covid tests?
Anything to connect Trump and Putin in the minds of voters prior to Election Day...
Just a reminder, kung flu deaths per million population:
World 899
US 3,642
China 4
https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/#google_vignette
John Henry
Yup.
A Fauci himself said, if the test is cycled less than about 20 times, it will not detect Kung Flu in a vat of pure virus. If it is cycled 40 times, it will detect it in a rock. Depending on how they ran the test, and guidance varied on this during the plandemic, they could either find massive amounts of Kung Flu or none at all.
(Cycles are from memory and approximate)
John Henry
It looks to me like they're taking a fact, any fact, and then weaving a story around it. It'll survive a fact-check accusation - which is great ! as long as it can make Trump look bad.
Nothing unless it can suggest Trump is a Putin stooge, then it will be noted as something sinister. Just like closing the borders for a pandemic was wrong when Trump did it, but when Biden placed limits on international travel, it was smart and prudent, even if you could illegally cross the border with Covid.
"No one can know what would have happened if Trump had remained President, but was there something obviously wrong with sending these Covid tests? I'm not seeing it."
The complainers wanted some Russians to die from COVID?
Put the words Trump, Putin, and cooperation in the same sentence and you have a news story. It doesn't need to make sense.
Put the words Trump, Putin, and cooperation in the same sentence and you have a news story. It doesn't need to make sense.
Yes, but I am expecting to hear from Nurse Ratched soon that this is more evidence of Russian collusion with Trump.
Former president Trump violated the Logan Act (which restricts private citizens from engaging in diplomatic affairs with U.S. rivals) when he spoke with Russian President Vladimir Putin some seven times since leaving office. Violation of the Logan Act is a felony, punishable with imprisonment for up to three years. So 7 times 3 would likely jail Trump for life when added to the 34 felonies for which he has already been convicted.
You missed Kamala on Colbert saying that Americans were desperate, DESPERATE, to get those tests. https://www.msn.com/en-us/tv/news/kamala-harris-addresses-reports-that-trump-sent-putin-covid-tests-during-stephen-colbert-interview/ar-AA1rVvho
Pure Agitprop.
Give a rest, a-hole.
I'm baffled. During a pandemic, Trump showed that he can work with Putin. What's the problem? Putin didn't invade while Trump was in office, and, he's got enough good will that perhaps he can negotiate an end to the Ukraine war.
If we believe that Kremlin spokesman about the Covid tests, then we must believe him about the lack of phone calls after Trump was out of office. Anyone who says that Trump did call Putin, is a liar and has no credibility.
Yes, my progressive friends on Facebook are already eagerly reposting this. The Russian hoax is alive and well.
As stated above, what kind of tests are we talking about (take home or medical office grade), how many, and what was the cost? The fact that this is not mentioned upfront in the article is a tip-off IMO that this story is much ado about nothing significant.
I'm sure not seeing it either. Why not send tests when fighting a world wide epidemic of the Chinese lung rot? And Gadfly what did you have to say when San Fran Nan put on a head scarf and went on her own little diplomacy tour in the Mid East during the Bush years? Crickets is what I hear from you.
I distinctly remember this argument back in 2020. As if the tests made any difference. There was no treatment. If you thought you were sick, stay home. But no, the inability to deliver the tests were considered a massive failure of the Trump admin at the time by some.
… but was there something obviously wrong with sending these Covid tests? I'm not seeing it.
Me either.
C'mon. Woodward is a lying shit-weasel. And the fucking tests don't work anyway.
It doesn't say how many tests were sent and there are legitimate diplomatic and humanitarian reasons to help other nations during times of crisis, but if Trump was sending large numbers of test to Russia while there was a shortage here, it undermines his "America First" positioning.
The China number is a joke. We have no idea how many Chinese died from COVID. Literally no idea; not even an estimate. The other numbers are suspect as well due to the "died from/died with" distinction.
Many US health statistics look bad compared to other countries simply because the US is more strict about how we count and categorize.
There's no law against a private citizen talking with the head of state of another country.
What an absurd accusation!
We all know the 2020 election was fixed and DJT is the legitimate President. Therefore any diplomatic discussions - if any even occurred in their talks - did not violate the Logan Act.
One wonders if Woodward is using Steele's sources, 2 drunk Russians at a pub.
Am I missing something? Trump had to send Putin these tests to maintain a good relationship with him. It would have been crazy and pointless to say no.
Oh wait, just saw this: https://x.com/KarluskaP/status/1843788918787059729
I see now that the source for the "phone calls" was "a Trump aid". Madison Hutchinson was a Trump aid, and progressives like to quote her imaginative recollections on a regular basis. Alas, I suggest others check the link, and hear what another foreign leader has to think about Trump's handling of Putin.
Give Trump a chance to trade useless tests for good will from an adversary, and he’ll take it.
It was a pandemic that did not originate in America. Transnational cooperation to mitigate its progress would be mandatory for health and human services.
It sets up reciprocity. Future negotiations work better.
I'm trying really hard to find what's newsworthy/scandalous about this.
Okay. So this makes them BFF?
What was "obviously wrong" was the fact that Trump did it. Duh!
"but was there something obviously wrong with sending these Covid tests? I'm not seeing it."
Trump and Putin. Inga would be my goto splainer for why it's wrong.
The NSA and the other 15 Intell agencies knew all of the Presidents phone calls.! Tell them to release them if it’s real after the 2000 election.
Any test were the right gesture while we were at peace with Vladymir
Did Woodward put in the part where CIA director William Casey came back from the dead and told Trump to do it? That worked once before…
Related:
Jake Tapper isn't a journalist, he is a gossip.
Most of our media are mere gossips.
It's not like there's an impermeable border around Russia. If the idea was to detect as many cases as possible in order to stop the spread of the virus, then detecting them in Russia is as important as detecting them anywhere else.
If the tests hadn't been sent there, the narrative would be that Trump let politics get in the way of fighting the virus.
The 2 seconds of pure silence after BoJo finishes his answer about Trump and Putin were absolutely priceless.
Mutaman, you are a fluke of the universe and whether you can hear it or not , the universe is laughing behind your back.
For one thing, Biden wanted the war, Trump didn't. Biden invited him in with his "minor incursion" comment at the same time his Secretary of State was telling Putin's Foreign Minister that Ukraine was going to be in NATO and as soon as it was, we were putting nukes five minutes from Moscow. Putin invaded three days later.
This was an easily avoided war of choice for the United States. For one thing, we could have stayed out of Ukraine's politics, overthrowing their govt twice, and the second time the Ukrainians voted back in a Russia friendly government, which was Zelensky's whole platform, we just ordered him to ignore the voters and provoke Russia further by undertaking an "anti-terrorism" operation in the Russian speaking regions of Ukraine, using heavy weapons, with the goal of wiping out Russian as a language of government, which would, of course, have the effect of only allowing Ukrainian speakers in positions of power anywhere in the country. Imagine regions that have been Russian for longer than the US has existed now governed by a cadre of 'Dr Weevil's.
They work day at night to get us conditions to believing absurdities, like this was anything other than a goodwill gesture. Remember, these are the same people who were writing editorials that we should deny Syria aid after that devastating earthquake, the same people who use starvation, err, I mean "sanctions" on country after country, then makes jokes about how skinning the people are getting in those countries. Yes, we are the same country which killed off the buffalo as part of a deliberate strategy to starve the Plains Indians into submission.
If Trump makes a phone call to Putin, then the NSA is certainly and, like it or not, legally listening in.
Considering that it was experiments approved and funded by Dr Fauci and our own NIH, performed in China because they would have been illegal here, that is to say that we concocted the virus out of bat sputum run through a CRISPR machine and spliced with snippets from HIV, we owed it to the world to do everything we could.
It was Putin who wanted it kept secret for obvious domestic reasons.
Thousands of illegal immigrants could enter the country without testing yet citizens can''t enter a government building.............
John Kerry was carrying out his own foreign policy with Iran. Ted Kennedy used John Tunney to haggle with the Soviets. And then there's the Clinton's and their foundation. And the rumors about Nixon, Anna Chennault and the South Vietnamese. The Logan Act is a dead letter, but if anybody deserves to be prosecuted under it, it's not Trump.
It was Cassidy Hutchinson, but she might as well have been one of the many Madisons in her generation.
Putin would love a Kamala presidency.
So would Xi, so would Khamenei, so would Little Rocket Man, …
I'm not seeing it
Me neither. It is lame attempt to raise the Russia, Russia thing again.
A more valid complaint would be the hundreds of thousands of ventilators that he had produced. They were more damaging than helpful, and they're probably clogging landfills now.
Nancy Pelosi has been in the House of Representatives since 1987. She served as Speaker of the House when GeeDubYa was President which made her 3rd in line to the presidency. Hows them crickets?
RUSSIA RUSSIA RUSSIA we already know they are bff's , Vlad may have a position open for him when he gets vanquished,melody runs off with Mike Pence and he skips bond to get out of court hearings. BUT they'll find him with the WEATHER CONTROL machine that can do more than send hurricanes to red states you know,,ask Marjorie!
Isn't this Diplomacy 101? A foreign leader wants a petty favor, you do him a favor. He wants to go to Disney Land, you get him a picture next to Goofy. He wants some COVID tests at a time when they're tough to find? You send him a big box with a gift card saying FROM YOUR FRIENDS IN THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA.
It's just human nature. People use things like this to judge how friendly and open to deals you might be. The last thing you want to do is say no and later realize that Putin was using this as a conversation starter about some issue you care about.
Former White House adviser and United Nations ambassador Susan Rice called out former President Trump over a report that he has spoken with Russian President Vladimir Putin at least seven times since leaving office, suggesting such calls would violate the Logan Act.
The law, which makes it illegal for American citizens to negotiate with foreign governments in dispute with the United States without prior approval, was introduced in 1799 and is meant to prevent unauthorized diplomacy from undermining the current administration’s positionTrump’s campaign has broadly denied claims made in the book. However, Trump has often boasted about his close relationship with Putin and has pressured Republicans to block military aid to Ukraine in its war against Russia.
This would seem to be a violation of the Logan Act. Exactly what Trump falsely accused John Kerry of. Another apparent Trump crime,” Rice wrote Tuesday on the social platform X.
Rice was referring to Trump’s public pressure campaign to prosecute Kerry, a former secretary of state, over private meetings with Iranian officials during the Trump administration to urge Tehran to stay in the Iran Nuclear Deal, brokered by the Obama administration. Trump later pulled the U.S. from the agreement.
“John Kerry violated the Logan Act,” Trump said during a White House press briefing in May 2019. “He’s talking to Iran and has many meetings and many phone calls and he’s telling them what to do. That is [a] total violation of the Logan Act.”
This is not the first time it’s been suggested that Trump has run afoul of the Logan Act.
We all know this guy violates all laws he is an indicted convicted perp what would you expect .A prefect nominee for president right WHITE HOUSE OR BIG HOUSE!
Our local hospital reported zero deaths from flu. Just COVID-19. Not that I’m suspicious or anything, but weren’t they paid more for treating COVID patients versus flu or other URT infections?
No. We never really had a problem with availability of test kits. What we had was a surplus’s of government meddling.
I can safely say that neither of us were ever tested, nor do we really know whether or not either of us ever caught the Kung Flu. And we are both on Medicare. It was silly to test below Medicare eligibility, absent early and well known comorbidities, and evil to then push, then require, vaccinations with an experimental type of vaccination, esp since adequate testing of the vaccines, delivery vehicle, and manufacturing process had been bypassed (as well as liability and warning notifications - saw a Pfizer PSA tonight still pushing its vaccines, with no notice whatsoever about possible side effects, supposedly justified because it was a PSA for its product, and not an advertisement). It was a manufactured panic, in order to steal elections and enrich big pharma companies. Testing, if anything just exacerbated the problem, and probably prevented very, very, few deaths.
“The China number is a joke. We have no idea how many Chinese died from COVID. Literally no idea; not even an estimate.”
Esp since they were in full coverup mode by then. They created the virus at their WIV lab (using some funding from Fauci, et Al.) Then, they let it escape into the general public, likely through sloppy lab practices, very possibility through a cheaper BSL 2 lab, instead of the BSL 4 lab they should have used. The lab, then the city, the province, and ultimately the country tried to cover it up, to no avail. The virus moved faster than the bureaucracy could. Moreover, with their fictitious 4 per million death rate, many were left with the impression that their manufactured virus was somehow tailored to skip Han Chinese.
Tim. Word on the ground was that in the Wuhan area the crematoriums were were working around the clock and still could not keep up.
Speech therapy in Doha, Qatar
In 2020, Putin had not invaded Ukraine. Why would you not assist during a global pandemic? We bought masks from China, for example.
The NSA would have recorded the calls. Biden is running the FBI and DOJ...don't you think they're are taking Trump cases pretty seriously already?
LOL/
If it even happened.
If there was nothing wrong with sending the COVID testing machines, then why was it done covertly? Is it protocol that the President can just secretly hand over aid to a foreign country?
Trump deployed Navy Hospital ships to Los Angeles and New York City at the request of city leaders to help with alleged hospital bed shortages due to the covid pandemic, however, neither ship was utilized by local leaders.
And don't forget that many Democrats called for "vaccine passports" while keeping people off beaches and out of city parks. And some Governors seized "emergency powers" that continued well beyond the danger period.
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