Donald Trump secretly slipped Vladimir Putin some American Covid tests for his personal use, a bombshell new book has claimed.
Trump allegedly supplied the Kremlin with tests - which, at the time, were in short supply - to be used by the Russian premier at the height of the Covid pandemic.
The book, War, by veteran American journalist Bob Woodward, who broke the Watergate scandal, said a former Trump aide had told him about the hushed-up shipment.
Woodward said that Putin had warned Trump not to reveal that he had supplied the tests over fears of a public backlash in the US.
Bob Woodward said a former Trump aide had told him about the hushed-up shipment
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In the book, he writes that the Russian leader told Trump: "I don't want you to tell anybody because people will get mad at you, not me."
Trump has - and continues to - come under fire for his links to Putin, and Woodward writes how the two leaders held a phone call as recently as early this year, just as Trump's successor Joe Biden was sending more weapons to Ukraine.
"War" alleges that Trump has secretly maintained a close relationship with the Russian President since leaving the White House in January 2021.
Regardless, in public, Trump has made headline-grabbing claims about Putin - telling GB News the latter "would not have invaded Ukraine" had he still been in office.
The book claims that the pair have spoken as many as seven times - prompting its author to conclude that Trump is a worse President than even Richard Nixon, who resigned over Watergate.
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Biden is accused of describing Israeli PM Benjamin Netanyahu as a "son of a b***h"
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"Trump was the most reckless and impulsive president in American history - and is demonstrating the very same character as a presidential candidate in 2024," Woodward wrote.
The book has also brought fresh details to light about the outgoing Biden's approach to world leaders.
Behind closed doors, the 81-year-old incumbent president is accused of describing Israeli PM Benjamin Netanyahu as a "son of a b***h" and a "bad f**king guy".
In public, Biden has remained a staunch supporter of Netanyahu in his war against Hamas.
Biden is said to have described Putin as "the epitome of evil" behind closed doors
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Woodward also reveals that Biden believed that, at one point in the Ukraine war, there was a 50 per cent chance that Putin would use nuclear weapons on the battlefield - and had intelligence as early as October 2021, four months before Russia's so-called "special military operation", which suggested Putin was planning to invade Ukraine.
Some of the intelligence obtained by the Biden administration, Woodward writes, reportedly came from a spy run by the US intelligence services inside the Kremlin.
Biden is said to have described Putin as "the epitome of evil" behind closed doors.
But Steven Cheung, a spokesman for the Trump campaign, has denied the account of his man's relationship with Putin, and claimed Trump had given the reporter "no access".
"None of these made-up stories by Bob Woodward are true," he said.
