Trump met with Russian foreign minister at Putin's request: report

[timosman]

http://thehill.com/homenews/administration/332866-trump-met-with-russian-foreign-minister-at-putins-request-report


05/10/17

http://thehill.com/sites/default/files/styles/thumb_small_article/public/blogs/trumplavrov.png

President Trump’s meeting with Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov on Wednesday was requested by Russian President Vladimir Putin, according to a report.

A White House spokesman told Politico that Putin requested the two meet during Trump’s last phone call with the foreign leader.

“He chose to receive him because Putin asked him to,” the spokesman said. “Putin did specifically ask on the call when they last talked.”
The White House said in a statement Trump expressed “his desire to build a better relationship between the United States and Russia” during the meeting.

The meeting was closed to the press, but both the Kremlin and the Russian Embassy in the United States tweeted photos of Trump with Lavrov and Russian Ambassador Sergey Kislyak.

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Trump’s meeting with Lavrov came just one day after Trump fired FBI director James Comey, who was responsible for overseeing the FBI’s investigation into possible ties and collusion between Trump’s 2016 campaign and Russian officials.

[Danke]

OMG

[UWDude]

SMOKING GUN!!!

[r3volution 3.0]

My money says the TV character gets rolled by the professional diplomat.

[UWDude]

My money says the TV character gets rolled by the professional diplomat.

Good. Lavrov is a very sane man in an insane world.

[Zippyjuan]

https://www.nytimes.com/2017/05/10/us/politics/trump-russia-meeting-american-reporters-blocked.html?_r=0


Trump Bars U.S. Press, but Not Russia’s, at Meeting With Russian Officials

WASHINGTON — When President Trump met with top Russian officials in the Oval Office on Wednesday, White House officials barred reporters from witnessing the moment. They apparently preferred to block coverage of the awkwardly timed visit as questions swirled about whether the president had dismissed his F.B.I. director in part to squelch the investigation into possible ties between his campaign and Moscow.

But the Russians, who have a largely state-run media, brought their own press contingent in the form of an official photographer. They quickly filled the vacuum with their own pictures of the meeting with Mr. Trump, Sergey V. Lavrov, the Russian foreign minister, and Sergey I. Kislyak, Moscow’s ambassador to the United States.

Within minutes of the meeting, the Foreign Ministry had posted photographs on Twitter of Mr. Trump and Mr. Lavrov smiling and shaking hands. The Russian embassy posted images of the president grinning and gripping hands with the ambassador. Tass, Russia’s official news agency, released more photographs of the three men laughing together in the Oval Office.

The White House released nothing.

The result was a public relations coup of sorts for Russia and Mr. Lavrov in particular, who not only received a collegial Oval Office welcome from the president, but the photographic evidence to prove it. By contrast, when Secretary of State Rex W. Tillerson traveled to Moscow last month, President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia kept him waiting for hours before granting him an audience at the Kremlin. Then, too, Mr. Tillerson left his American press contingent behind.

Mr. Kislyak has figured prominently in the furor surrounding the Trump team’s contacts with Moscow. It was conversations between the ambassador and Michael T. Flynn, the president’s former national security adviser, that ultimately led to Mr. Flynn’s ouster in February, ostensibly because he had lied to Vice President Mike Pence about whether the two had discussed United States sanctions on Russia. The White House had not divulged that Mr. Kislyak was to be present at Wednesday’s meeting.

Mr. Trump’s session with Mr. Lavrov was listed on his schedule as “Closed Press,” meaning the news media would not have a chance to photograph or otherwise document the meeting. “Our official photographer and their official photographer were present — that’s it,” a White House aide said, speaking on condition of anonymity, lacking authorization to describe the ground rules.

The difference, of course, is that while official White House photographers have broad access to the president, their presence is not considered a substitute for that of independent news media, which routinely request and secure access to official presidential movements and meetings so they can obtain their own images and produce their own reports. In Russia, where the independent news media are severely limited, there is no such regular press access to government officials apart from state-controlled organizations.

On Wednesday morning, when the American press pool was assembled unexpectedly in the West Wing, reporters thought that White House officials might have reconsidered and decided to allow a glimpse of Mr. Trump’s meeting with the Russians after all. But instead, they were allowed into the Oval Office for a few moments to cover another, previously undisclosed meeting: between Mr. Trump and Henry Kissinger, the Nixon administration’s secretary of state.

Comey was fired as FBI Director the day before this secret meeting with Russian officials.

[milgram]

I hope it was a productive meeting. Trump should go back to his campaign positions on Russia instead of trying to appease DC retards.


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JOf8HuYzX1c

[Danke]

Trump Trolls Hate-Filled Democrats — And I Can’t Stop Laughing

RUSH: Hi, friends. This is great. I have been laughing all morning long. I have been laughing starting with last night. Can we agree that Donald Trump is probably enjoying this more than anybody wants to admit or that anybody knows? So he fires Comey yesterday. Who’s he meeting with today? (laughing) He’s meeting with the Soviet, the Russian foreign minister, Sergey Lavrov! I mean, what an epic troll this is. The Democrat Party is going bananas — completely, totally unhinged — on the road to literal insanity.


https://www.rushlimbaugh.com/daily/2017/05/10/trump-trolls-hate-filled-democrats-and-i-cant-stop-laughing/

[AZJoe]

Trump Bars U.S. Press, but Not Russia’s, at Meeting With Russian Officials

Leave is to the Zip to spread fake news nonsense hysteria. Can the level of US MSM anti-Russia tinfoil paranoia lunacy (http://original.antiwar.com/justin/2017/05/11/shut-down-the-russia-gate-farce/) possibly get any more absurd.

No the they did not ban US photographers while allowing Russian photographers. Exactly two photographers were admitted (http://www.yaktrinews.com/news/politics/national-politics/russia-reacts-to-white-house-photo-outrage-this-is-nonsense/494569991) to the room for the photo op: the official White House photographer, and the official photographer for Russian Foreign Minister Lavrov. Imagine that. They both got to have exactly one photographer for the historical meeting with the highest ranking Russian diplomat. You can take the tin foil off now.


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=prDcFur2sVE

[enhanced_deficit]

About time for direct dialog instead of communications through proxy wars and bloodbaths in Syria/Benghazi/Iraq etc.

This meeting should have happened the first day a civilian was killed by ISIS terrorists. Unfortunately disgraced DGP puppet (http://www.ronpaulforums.com/showthread.php?502216-Erection-2008-Video-Surfaces-Of-Obama-Flaunting-His-Junk-to-Reporters-on-Campaign-Plane&p=6451014&viewfull=1#post6451014) had other more pressing things on his plate such as behaving like "founder of ISIS".

Obama Years: A Violent Chapter in World History (http://www.ronpaulforums.com/showthread.php?498046)