Donald Trump said he has “never discussed” reports of alleged Russian bounties on US troops in Afghanistan with Vladimir Putin, despite having reportedly spoken with the Russian president on at least eight occasions since the intelligence was included in his daily briefing.
The president received a daily briefing in February that said Russia was placing bounties on the heads of US troops, with payments costing up to $100,000, according to the New York Times.
But in a new interview released on Wednesday, he said his most recent call with Mr Putin was scheduled “to discuss other things” that did not include Russian interference in Afghanistan.
“That was a phone call to discuss other things, and frankly, that’s an issue that many people said was fake news,” Mr Trump told Axios on HBO, later adding: “I have never discussed it with him, no.”
Asked about whether he believed the reported US intelligence on Russian bounties, Mr Trump appeared to deflect. “You know, it’s interesting, nobody ever brings up China — they always bring Russia, Russia, Russia”, the president said.
“It never reached my desk,” he then claimed about the alleged Russian bounty reports. “If it reached my desk, I would have done something about it. It never reached my desk.”
The president said he has discussed nuclear proliferation — an issue he described as being more important than global warming “in terms of the real world” — and other issues with Mr Putin, and “would have no problem” discussing the Russian bounties as well.
However, Mr Trump claimed some US intelligence officials “didn’t think it was worthy” of bringing the issue to his desk.
The president’s assertion that reports of Russian bounties were not brought to his desk goes against the reporting that said he received the intelligence in his daily briefing months ago, an issue Axios raised in the Tuesday interview.
Asked whether he reads his briefings, Mr Trump responded: “I do. I read a lot. You know, I read a lot. They like to say I don’t read. I read a lot. I comprehend extraordinarily well. Probably better than anybody you’ve interviewed in a long time. I read a lot.”
