Russian President Vladimir Putin lobbied President Donald Trump on issues related to nuclear arms control and continuing the prohibition on weapons in space, according to leaked documents obtained by Politico.
According to a U.S. government official who provided Politico with a translated version of the documents, the memo was shared with Trump during their two hour private meeting in Helsinki in July– the summit that was followed by an unruly press conference with the two world leaders. The document was originally obtained by a person who received the memo from a Russian official, according to Politico. The White House told Politico that Trump had not received any paperwork from Putin and declined to comment further.
The document reportedly reveals a surprising degree of normalcy in the private discussion held between the two leaders, a far-cry from what was exhibited during the press conference, when Trump appeared to accept Putin’s public denial of meddling in the 2016 election.
U.S. officials have been scratching their heads trying to pin-point what was discussed or agreed to during the tête-à-tête ever since Russia’s ambassador to the U.S. told the media in Moscow last month that Trump and Putin had reached several “verbal agreements.” The U.S. Director of National Intelligence even publicly admitted last week that he was out of the loop on what was discussed.
“I’m not in a position to either understand fully or talk about what happened in Helsinki,” he told reporters last week.
