Trump and Putin meet

Beyond firing off tweets critical of the US’s historically close European allies, Trump also reportedly arrived 30 minutes late to the first day of the summit, missing two big meetings with other world leaders and causing NATO’s secretary-general to call an emergency session.

And the President gave no criticism of Russian Federation or the cyber-hacking of the 2016 election USA intelligence agencies say the leader of the Eastern superstate co-ordinated. Former Speaker of the House Newt Gingrich, a Trump ally whose wife serves as Trump’s ambassador to the Vatican, called Trump’s stance “the most serious mistake of his presidency.”

In the lead-up to the meeting, the media, the Democrats, American citizens and even Trump’s own party were concerned that the president wasn’t going to push Putin on the Russian Federation hacking issue. “The only reason, the only reason that Trump put sanctions on Russian Federation was because Congress said, “we don’t trust you not to put sanctions” and they passed what was called CAATSA that took away the president’s authority to walk away from those sanctions”. “Probably not.” Congressional resolutions don’t carry the force of law.

“The damage inflicted by President Trump’s naiveté, egotism, false equivalence, and sympathy for autocrats is hard to calculate”.

“Vladimir Putin is not our friend and never has been”.

Rep. Adam Kinzinger, R-Ill., told CNN that Trump’s performance was “very embarrassing”.

Another senior Republican, Sen Lindsey Graham, also a member of the Senate Armed Services Committee, tweeted that it was a “missed opportunity.to firmly hold Russian Federation accountable for 2016 meddling”. Rand Paul of Kentucky, dismissed the president’s critics as those who hate the president.

Terming the press conference of US President Donald Trump and his Russian counterpart Vladimir Putin in Helsinki “embarrassing”, “Terminator” star Arnold Schwarzenegger has said that the former acted like a “fanboy” of the Russian leader.

However, it remains unclear if Trump secured Putin’s help to maintain global sanctions and pressure on the Kim Jong-un regime.

Asked by Stephanopoulos whether he believes Putin has compromising information on Trump, Flake said, “I have a hard time believing that”.

Scaramucci added, “The optics of the situation are a disaster”.

Standing alongside Mr Putin, Mr Trump steered clear of any confrontation with the Russian, going so far as to question American intelligence and last week’s federal indictments that accused 12 Russians of hacking into Democratic email accounts to hurt Hillary Clinton in 2016.

The statement from Dan Coats, the Director of National Intelligence, did not directly reference Trump’s comments at a news conference alongside Putin in Helsinki.

One of the sharpest reactions came from Republican Sen.

“So many people at the higher ends of intelligence loved my press conference performance in Helsinki”. Ben Sasse of Nebraska.