Trump critics think this one comment proves Putin ‘manipulated’ him in Alaska

US president Donald Trump is continuing to face criticism over how he handled his discussions with Russian president Vladimir Putin in Alaska on Friday, with Fox News – yes, really – saying he was “steamrolled” by his Russian counterpart, and social media users accusing the White House of attempting to change the narrative on how it went with a picture it posted online.

Trump insisted his meeting with Putin was “very productive”, even though they failed to reach any agreement on a ceasefire deal for Ukraine after almost three hours.

In an interview with Fox News host Sean Hannity following the Alaska talks, Trump said: “[He] said something – one of the most interesting things: he said ‘your election was rigged because you have mail-in voting.’

“He said, ‘mail-in voting, every election – no country has mail-in voting. It’s impossible to have mail-in voting and have honest elections.’

“He said that to me because we talked about 2020. He said, ‘you won that election by so much … and if you would have won, we wouldn’t have had a war, we’d have all of these millions of people alive now instead of dead’.

“And he said, ‘and you lost it because of mail-in voting, it was a rigged election.’”

The comments attributed by Trump to Putin – who has not yet confirmed the exchange – are points the US president himself has made in the past, with his debunked claims that the 2020 election was ‘stolen’ from him being well-documented.

Back in August 2020, at the Republican National Convention in North Carolina, Trump alleged the use of mail-in ballots was a Democrat-led attempt to disrupt a “fair and free election”.

He said: “This is going to be one of the greatest scams. They’re going to mail out 80 million ballots. It’s impossible, they have no idea.

“Who’s mailing them? Mostly Democrat states and Democrat governors.”

As for his remarks about the war in Ukraine, Trump boasted in September 2022 – just several months after Russian forces invaded the country – that the war “would not have happened if I were president”.

Trump’s claims about the conversation with Putin about elections have since been criticised by social media users, who claim the US president was “manipulated” and ‘gaslit’ by his Russian counterpart:

Majid Padellan, known online as Brooklyn Dad Defiant, pointed out that many other countries allow for mail-in ballots (indeed, the UK is one of them):

Author Max Fisher wrote that Trump was “truly the easiest mark in human history”:

Content creator Hutch said Trump’s “narcissism” is the “easiest s*** ever to manipulate because he’s too f***ing stupid to know when he’s being played”:

Mehdi Hasan, editor-in-chief and CEO of Zeteo, despaired that it was “so pathetic how easy it is to own America’s president”:

CNN senior political commentator Adam Kinzinger said Trump was “just so easy to manipulate”:

And Independent columnist Ahmed Baba said Trump “always falsely claims America was taken advantage of and manipulated before he took office”, only to have “zero self-awareness for when he’s taken advantage of and manipulated”:

If it’s true that Putin – of all people – gave Trump election advice, then this would be despite the 2024 Russian election being described by independent vote monitoring watchdog in the country as the most fraudulent in the country’s history.

The Kremlin said Putin won with more than 87 per cent of the vote.

Why not read…

• Did Putin send a ‘body double’ to meet with Trump in Alaska?
• Trump’s ‘day one’ promise to Americans has been completely exposed

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