New Bob Woodward book reveals Trump’s links to Putin

Bob Woodward has a keen sense of timing. With the US presidential election less than a month away, the veteran Washington Post journalist is preparing to publish a new book with a striking title, War (Simon & Schuster). On Tuesday, October 8, a number of media outlets revealed some of its salient claims. The book reviews Donald Trump’s and Joe Biden’s handling of international crises, drawing, as customary with Woodward, on a very large number of sources.

One of the revelations concerns the relationship between Trump and Vladimir Putin. In 2020, when he was still president, the billionaire reportedly sent his Russian counterpart the first Covid-19 test devices then available in the US. Putin was known to be particularly anxious not to fall ill. “I don’t want you to tell anybody because people will get mad at you, not me,” the Russian president is reported to have said.

Astounding information

Another staggering piece of information, delivered by an anonymous Trump aide in Mar-a-Lago: The two men would have spoken by phone around half a dozen times after the billionaire’s departure from the White House, in January 2021. This includes the period following the Russian invasion of Ukraine in February 2022. Steven Cheung, Trump’s communications director, issued a statement insulting Woodward, describing him as “slow,” “lethargic,” and “incompetent.” His scoops would be “made up”, the text claims, though it does not explicitly deny telephone contact between the two men. The last call, according to the book, took place in early 2024. An aide was allegedly kicked out of Trump’s office when he wanted to speak with Putin.

Woodward, who along with Carl Bernstein revealed the Watergate scandal that led to President Nixon’s resignation in 1974, talks at length about Biden’s actions and private comments. The US president is said to have been critical, for example, of Barack Obama over the annexation of Crimea in 2014. “Barack never took Putin seriously,” Biden is quoted as saying. In private, Biden reportedly called Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu a “fucking liar.” In July, he warned him that Israel was perceived as a “rogue state.”