Trump sets expectations low for summit
‘Maybe some good will come out’ of Helsinki meeting with Putin, U.S. president says
HELSINKI — U.S. President Donald Trump arrived in Finland on Sunday for a closely watched one-on-one summit with Russian President Vladimir Putin, hours after telling an interviewer that he was going into the meeting on Monday with “low expectations.”
His national security adviser said they aren’t looking for “concrete deliverables.”
Trump also told CBS News in an interview conducted Saturday that he “hadn’t thought” about asking Putin to extradite the dozen Russian military intelligence officers indicted this past week in Washington on charges related to the hacking of Democratic targets in the 2016 U.S. presidential election.
But after being given the idea by his interviewer, Trump said, “Certainly I’ll be asking about it.”
He blamed the Democratic National Committee for “allowing themselves to be hacked” by Russians trying to help elect him.
The U.S. has no extradition treaty with Moscow and can’t compel Russia to hand over citizens. Russia’s constitution prohibits extraditing its citizens to foreign countries.
Asked whether Trump would ask Putin to turn over the 12 military intelligence officials, U.S. national security adviser John Bolton called the idea “pretty silly” and said doing so would put the president in a “weak position.”
He said Trump goes into the summit with a stronger hand because of the indictments.
“I think the president can put this on the table and say, ‘This is a serious matter that we need to talk about,’” Bolton said.
He said asking for the indicted Russians to be turned over would have the opposite effect.
“For the president to demand something that isn’t going to happen puts the president in a weak position, and I think the president has made it very clear he intends to approach this discussion from a position of strength.”
In the CBS News interview, Trump said he’s entering the Helsinki summit with “low expectations. I’m not going with high expectations.”
He declined to discuss his goals, but said such sessions are beneficial.
He cited his historic meeting with North Korean leader Kim Jong Un in June as a “good thing,” along with meetings he’s had with Chinese President Xi Jinping.
“Nothing bad is going to come out of it (Helsinki), and maybe some good will come out,” Trump said.
He described the European Union, a bloc of nations that includes many of America’s closest allies, as a “foe.”
“I think the European Union is a foe, what they do to us in trade,” Trump said, adding that “you wouldn’t think of the European Union but they’re a foe.”
He said Russia is a foe “in certain respects” and that China is a foe “economically ... but that doesn’t mean they are bad. It doesn’t mean anything. It means that they are competitive.”
Trump has been reluctant to criticize Putin over the years and has described him as a competitor in recent days.
Trump said he respects Europe’s leaders but adds they’ve taken advantage of the U.S. on trade and defence spending.
The president sat for the interview Saturday in Scotland and CBS News released excerpts on Sunday.
From aboard Air Force One, Trump called the U.S. news media
“the enemy of the people” as he headed to sit down with Putin.
Trump complained that “No matter how well I do at the summit” he’ll face “criticism that it wasn’t good enough.”
“If I was given the great city of Moscow as retribution for all of the sins and evils committed by Russia over the years, I would return to criticism that it wasn’t good enough — that I should have gotten Saint Petersburg in addition!” he tweeted.
Trump also said: “Much of our news media is indeed the enemy of the people.”
Putin is regarded as creating a culture of violence and impunity that has resulted in the killing of some Russian journalists.
Trump regularly criticizes American news media outlets and has called out some journalists by name.
Trump and Putin have held talks twice before. Their first meeting came last July while both participated in an international summit and continued for more than two hours, well over the scheduled 30 minutes. The leaders also met last fall during a
separate summit in Vietnam.
But Jon Huntsman, the U.S. ambassador to Russia, said Monday’s meeting “is really the first time for both presidents to actually sit across the table and have a conversation and I hope it’s a detailed conversation about where we might be able to find some overlapping and shared interests.”
Congressional Democrats and at least one Republican have called on Trump to pull out of Monday’s meeting unless he is willing to make Russian electionmeddling the top issue.
Huntsman said the summit must go on because Russian engagement is needed to solve some international issues.
“The collective blood pressure between the United States and Russia is off-the-charts high so it’s a good thing these presidents are getting together,” he said.
Trump has said he will raise the issue of Russian election meddling, along with Syria, Ukraine, nuclear proliferation and other topics.
Bolton described the meeting as “unstructured.”