Trump-Putin relationship in the spotlight as new book describes calls
Visit our website:
http://www.france24.com
Like us on Facebook:
https://www.facebook.com/FRANCE24.English
Follow us on Twitter:
https://twitter.com/France24_en
Category
🗞
NewsTranscript
00:00Now, a new political book is levying new allegations at Republican presidential candidates and
00:09former President Donald Trump. Authored by Bob Woodward, who uncovered the Watergate
00:14scandal in the early 1970s, War takes a behind-the-scenes look at the presidencies of Joe Biden and
00:21Donald Trump through a combination of confidential documents, notes, transcripts and eyewitness
00:26testimonies. But it is the revelations about Donald Trump which have grabbed headlines.
00:32To tell us more, let's bring in our White House correspondent Fraser Jackson. Now, Fraser,
00:37Bob Woodward has written over a dozen bestsellers, including All the President's Men, which documented
00:43the 1972 Watergate scandal, which ultimately tanked Richard Nixon's presidency. What's
00:49this new book revealing about Donald Trump?
00:52Yeah, well, Bob Woodward, something of a legendary figure here in the United States. He's written
00:58books about many presidents and has almost chronicled every president, including Bill
01:04Clinton, Barack Obama, the Bushes. So he is somewhat of a legendary figure here. And this
01:09latest book is mainly focused on Joe Biden's presidency, but it does deal with the end
01:14of Donald Trump's presidency as well. And it's revelations from that part of the book
01:19onwards that are really starting to grab that attention. One of them surrounds COVID-19
01:24tests. There is a revelation from this, an allegation from Bob Woodward that he has from
01:29AIDS that Donald Trump sent COVID machines to Vladimir Putin during the height of COVID.
01:36He also has this verbatim transcript of a conversation between the two, which we can
01:42bring up on screen for you now. Putin says, please don't tell anybody you sent me, sent
01:47these to me. Trump says, I don't care. Fine. Putin then responds, no, no, I don't want
01:52you to tell anybody because people will get mad at you. Not me. They don't care about
01:57me. So one revelation coming from there and their close relationship is then also further
02:02detailed by more AIDS that have spoken to Bob Woodward. And those AIDS are telling Woodward
02:07that Donald Trump has had numerous phone calls with Vladimir Putin since he's left office
02:12in 2021. One AIDS as recently as the early this year said that he was told to leave the
02:18office so that Trump could have a conversation with Vladimir Putin. We're told they've spoken
02:22as many as seven times, although the contents of those conversations are not known. There
02:29has been a bit of pushback on this by the Trump camp. Jason Miller, top AIDS of Donald
02:35Trump, said to Bob Woodward that he would push back on these stories. And Stephen Chung,
02:40the director of communications for the Trump campaign, went even further in a statement
02:45on Tuesday. He said that all of the stories in this book were the work of a truly demented
02:50and deranged man who suffers from a debilitating case of Trump derangement syndrome. So some
02:56choice words there from Stephen Chung. Yeah, very interesting revelations there. The book
03:01also has new reporting on Joe Biden as well, doesn't it? Tell us more about that. Yeah,
03:08well, this is a lot of kind of back earlier reporting that Joe Biden is a fan of expletives,
03:15something that has been known to happen behind the scenes here at the White House. While
03:19there are new revelations coming out about him and his choice words as well, he, according
03:25to the book, spoke to one confidant who and in that conversation, he chastised Barack
03:31Obama for his handling of the Russian invasion of Ukraine in 2014. He said they, quote, they
03:37effed up in 2014. He said Barack never took Putin seriously, and he should never have
03:43let Putin just walk in there and saying that the US did, quote, nothing. He also says that
03:48he regretted choosing Merrick Garland as the attorney general of the United States. Of
03:53course, Merrick Garland was the was the top prosecutor who appointed a special counsel
03:58to look into Joe Biden's son, Hunter Biden, and his tax and gun charges. But the other
04:03thing, really, that is, again, grabbing headlines is the relationship between Joe Biden and
04:08Netanyahu. It's been no secret that has been fraught over in the last couple of months.
04:13But we are getting fresh words that Bob Woodward has revealed in this book. He writes that
04:18Netanyahu was called a, quote, son of a bitch by Joe Biden. And Joe Biden allegedly said
04:24he's a, quote, bad effing guy. So some very strong words that definitely the strongest
04:30we've ever heard from Biden about Netanyahu, if indeed it is true. And the book continues
04:34out with Netanyahu continuing to say he was going to kill every last member of Hamas.
04:39Biden had told him that was impossible, threatening both privately and publicly to withhold offensive
04:44U.S. weapons shipments to the country. So some big revelations from this book. And you
04:50can get your hands on it when it comes out in a couple of days time. Yeah, I'm sure many
04:54will be purchasing that book. Fraser Jackson, our White House correspondent, thank you so
04:58much for giving us your insight there. That's it for our daily zooming on the U.S. election.