Donald Trump secretly sent Covid-19 testing machines to Vladimir Putin in the early stages of the pandemic, when such resources were scarce, veteran reporter Bob Woodward reveals in a highly anticipated new book.

According to Woodward, Trump “secretly sent Putin a number of Abbott Point of Care Covid testing machines for his personal use.”

In response, the Russian president told his American counterpart: “I don’t want you to tell anyone because people will get angry with you.”

Remarkably, Woodward also reports that the relationship between the two men, which was hugely controversial during Trump’s first presidential campaign and subsequent four years in the White House, has continued since Trump is out of power, through no fewer than seven private conversations.

The revelations were among several published by US media on Tuesday, including dramatic scenes of Joe Biden warning Putin not to use nuclear weapons in Ukraine and new reporting on how Biden was convinced this summer to step aside as Democratic nominee for the presidency, paving the way for the vice president, Kamala Harris, to challenge Trump in November.

Now 81 — the same age as Biden — Woodward has been a Washington institution since the 1970s, when his work with Carl Bernstein on the Watergate scandal led to Richard Nixon’s resignation as president. After three books full of scoops on Trump’s presidency – Fear, Rage and Peril, the last he wrote with Robert Costa – Woodward’s new book, War, looks at key events under Biden, including the Russian war in Ukraine, the war of Israel against Hamas and political events. fights at home. It will be published next week.

Excerpts were released by Woodward’s two employers, the Washington Post and CNN.

Although the US and Russia shared medical equipment such as ventilators in the early stages of the pandemic, Trump’s decision to send Putin Covid testing machines would likely have proven hugely controversial had it been known.

Apparently, Putin recognized this and told Trump, “Please don’t tell anyone you sent this to me.”

Trump said: “I don’t care. Fine.”

Putin is said to have replied: “No, no. I don’t want you to tell anyone because people will get mad at you, not at me. They don’t care about me.”

Trump lost the White House later in 2020, but remarkably, Woodward says talks between the two men have continued. Earlier this year, Woodward writes, Trump ordered an aide to leave his office at Mar-a-Lago, Florida, so he could have a private conversation with Putin.

Concerns remain about Putin’s influence over Trump. Robert Mueller, the former FBI director who investigated ties between Trump and Moscow around the 2016 election and concluded that Putin wanted to help Trump defeat Hillary Clinton, recently said that Russia would interfere again this year.

According to the Post, Woodward reports that Jason Miller, a close Trump adviser, responded hesitantly when asked about Trump and Putin’s constant phone calls.

“Uh, ah, not that, ah, not that I’m aware of,” Miller reportedly said, adding, “I haven’t heard them talking, so I’d push back on that.”

Woodward added that Avril Haines, Biden’s director of national intelligence, had “carefully hedged,” saying: “I wouldn’t claim to be aware of all contacts with Putin. I wouldn’t want to talk about what President Trump did or didn’t do.”

On Tuesday, Trump’s communications director Steven Cheung said: “None of these made-up stories from Bob Woodward are true and are the work of a truly demented and disturbed man … clearly upset that President Trump is successfully suing him over the unauthorized publishing of recordings that he made before.”

That lawsuit concerns telephone tapes that Woodward released in 2022 and over which Trump filed a lawsuit the following year. Woodward has tried to have the lawsuit dismissed.

The drama surrounding Woodward’s new book comes less than a month after the November 5 presidential election, when Trump could return to power. According to Axios, which cited sources who had seen Woodward’s book, Woodward describes a Fourth of July lunch at the White House at which Antony Blinken, Biden’s secretary of state, discussed with the president whether he should withdraw given concerns about his age and condition.

Three weeks later, Biden withdrew, a historic decision that has put Trump’s own age, 78, and mental state in the spotlight. According to Woodward, Trump was “the most reckless and impulsive president in American history and exhibits exactly the same character as a 2024 presidential candidate,” according to the Post.

And yet Trump and Harris remain locked in a tight race despite Trump’s two impeachments, one for inciting the deadly Jan. 6 attack on Congress; his conviction on 34 criminal charges involving hush money payments; his other ongoing criminal cases, involving election subversion and the retention of classified information; millions of dollars in civil penalties in cases including a defamation suit arising from a rape claim that was deemed “substantially true” by the judge; and spreading other scandals.

Elsewhere, Woodward’s book reportedly reflects Biden’s candid responses to foreign policy challenges.

The president is reportedly pictured calling Benjamin Netanyahu, the right-wing Israeli prime minister who has resisted US efforts to broker a ceasefire with Hamas, “that son of a bitch” and “a bad guy!” mentions.

“Damn Putin,” Biden reportedly said of the Russian president. “Putin is bad. We are dealing with the height of evil.”

Russian aggression against Ukraine began when Barack Obama was US president. According to Woodward, Biden believes that the man under whom he was vice president between 2009 and 2017 “never took Putin seriously” – a position that is familiar from reports of tensions between the two men.

“They blew it in 2014” when Russia invaded Crimea, Biden told a friend, according to Woodward. “That’s why we’re here. We screwed up. Barack never took Putin seriously. We haven’t done anything. We have given Putin a license to continue! Well, I’m revoking his damn license!’

According to CNN, Woodward reports that in October 2021, US intelligence, including material from a precious human source within the Kremlin, showed “conclusively” that Putin was planning to invade Ukraine. Biden reportedly told CIA director Bill Burns: “Jesus Christ! Now I have to deal with Russia gobbling up Ukraine?”

According to Woodward, Biden confronted Putin twice in December, during a video conference and then a “50-minute hot call” in which Putin “brought up the risk of nuclear war in a threatening way” and Biden told him “it is impossible to win’. such a conflict.

Woodward also reports an October 2022 conversation between Lloyd Austin, the US Secretary of Defense, and his Russian counterpart, Sergei Shoigu, about possible use of nuclear weapons.

“Doing this would reconsider all the restrictions we have been working with in Ukraine,” Austin reportedly said. “This would isolate Russia on the world stage to an extent that you Russians cannot fully appreciate.”

Shoigu said: “I don’t like being threatened.”

Austin said: “Mr. Secretary, I am the leader of the most powerful military in the history of the world. I don’t make threats.”

In another phone call two days later, Woodward reports, Shoigu claimed that Ukraine was planning to use a “dirty bomb,” a claim the US deemed false but intended to justify a Russian nuclear attack.

“We don’t believe you,” Austin reportedly said. “We don’t see any indication of that, and the world will see through this. Don’t do it.”

“I understand,” Shoigu replied.

Colin Kahl, a senior Pentagon official, tells Woodward: “It was probably the most chilling moment of the entire war.”

Woodward also reports that the US had difficulty convincing Volodymyr Zelenskyy, the president of Ukraine, that Russia would actually invade. At the Munich Security Conference in February 2022, Harris reportedly told Zelenskyy to “think about things like having a succession plan… if you get captured or killed or can’t govern,” after which she left Germany thinking she Zelenskyy might not see again.

Russia invaded that month. Two and a half years later, the war drags on, challenging Zelensky in Kiev. However, Democrats warn that given Trump’s close ties to Putin, a second Trump presidency would have dire consequences for Ukraine and its allies.