Donald Trump will invite Vladimir Putin to visit Washington this autumn after the pair’s recent meeting in Helsinki, The White House has announced.
News of the invitation “stunned the nation’s top intelligence official”, Dan Coats, The New York Times reports. He first learned of the plan while being interviewed by NBC News at the Aspen Security Forum.
The Week
Escape your echo chamber. Get the facts behind the news, plus analysis from multiple perspectives.
Sign up for The Week's Free Newsletters
From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.
From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.
Coats, who is US director of national intelligence, has expressed misgivings about meetings between Trump and Putin, reports The Washington Post. He was concerned about the Helsinki summit because “no notes were taken and only two interpreters were present”, the paper says.
Preparations for the autumn meeting are “already underway”, according to CNN, after Trump told John Bolton, his national security adviser, to begin making arrangements.
Democrats have seized on the idea of having Putin visit Washington in the run-up to the mid-term elections in November. “Late October would be great for us,” Democratic Senator Brian Schatz tweeted.
No deal
Yesterday Trump rejected a request by Putin to let Russia interrogate several US citizens accused of unspecified crimes, including the former US ambassador to Moscow, Michael McFaul.
Putin had reportedly floated the idea with Trump as part of a deal in which US authorities could have interrogated 12 Russian operatives indicted last week as part of special counsel Robert Mueller’s investigation into Russian interference in the 2016 US presidential election.
Senior Republicans has expressed dismay that Trump would even consider the deal.
-
Elon Musk’s pivot from Mars to the moonIn the Spotlight SpaceX shifts focus with IPO approaching
-
‘Hong Kong is stable because it has been muzzled’Instant Opinion Opinion, comment and editorials of the day
-
Magazine solutions - February 20, 2026Puzzle and Quizzes Magazine solutions - February 20, 2026
-
Trump links funding to name on Penn StationSpeed Read Trump “can restart the funding with a snap of his fingers,” a Schumer insider said
-
Trump reclassifies 50,000 federal jobs to ease firingsSpeed Read The rule strips longstanding job protections from federal workers
-
Is the Gaza peace plan destined to fail?Today’s Big Question Since the ceasefire agreement in October, the situation in Gaza is still ‘precarious’, with the path to peace facing ‘many obstacles’
-
Vietnam’s ‘balancing act’ with the US, China and EuropeIn the Spotlight Despite decades of ‘steadily improving relations’, Hanoi is still ‘deeply suspicious’ of the US as it tries to ‘diversify’ its options
-
Trump demands $1B from Harvard, deepening feudSpeed Read Trump has continually gone after the university during his second term
-
Trump’s Kennedy Center closure plan draws ireSpeed Read Trump said he will close the center for two years for ‘renovations’
-
Trump's ‘weaponization czar’ demoted at DOJSpeed Read Ed Martin lost his title as assistant attorney general
-
Gabbard faces questions on vote raid, secret complaintSpeed Read This comes as Trump has pushed Republicans to ‘take over’ voting
