Leaked Document Reveals Content Of Putin-Trump Helsinki Meeting

Donald Trump, Vladimir Putin — FILE - In this July 16, 2018, file photo, U.S. President Donald Trump, left, and Russian President Vladimir Putin arrive for a press conference after their meeting at the Presidential Palace in Helsinki, Finland. If Donald Trump is serious about his public courtship of Vladimir Putin, he may want to take pointers from one of the Russian leader's longtime suitors: Chinese President Xi Jinping. In this political love triangle, Putin and Xi are tied by strategic need and a rare dose of personal affection, while Trump's effusive display in Helsinki showed him as an earnest admirer of the man leading a country long considered America's adversary. (AP Photo/Alexander Zemlianichenko, File)

Molly Boigon is a former associate producer and reporter for Learning Curve, WGBH’s K-12 education desk. She has also worked for Boston Public Radio and WGBH’s higher education desk, On Campus. Her interests include jazz, yoga and public records requests. Before joining WGBH, she worked at SiriusXM, WZBC and WAAF. She has a degree in Applied Psychology and Human Development from Boston College’s Lynch School of Education.

August 13, 2018

Russian President Vladimir Putin lobbied U.S. President Donald Trump during their meeting to extend various nuclear treaties and pursue weapons limits in Helsinki last month, according to a leaked document described by Politico.

News analyst Charlie Sennott called the contents of the document “pretty serious stuff that was on the table” during an appearance on Boston Public Radio today.

“Putin was in there lobbying Trump on arms control, talking with him about what kinds of things he wants to put forward for his agenda,” Sennott said. “This is what this leaked document is really revealing for the first time for us.”

Trump and Putin had a private meeting during their recent summit in Helsinki, which alarmed critics of Trump who worry about his cozy relationship to the Russian president.

Sennott said the fact that the men were discussing “controlling nuclear arms” and “prohibiting weapons in space” is evidence that Trump should not be left alone to talk to world leaders, because he might discuss agenda items with major diplomatic consequences.

“This is why it's a really bad idea to have this guy off on his own, talking to someone as knowledgeable as Putin, with as clear an agenda as he wants to put forward,” said Sennott.

Charlie Sennott is a news analyst here at WGBH, where he also heads up The GroundTruth project.