Which Is It?

Does Trump know Putin?  According to Trump:

11/2013: YES.  “I do have a relationship [with Putin], and I can tell you that he’s very interested in what we’re doing here today.”

3/2014: YES. “Putin even sent me a present” after Miss Universe contest.

5/2014: YES. “I was in Moscow recently and I spoke, indirectly and directly, with President Putin, who could not have been nicer, and we had a tremendous success.”

10/2015: YES.  Trump said that he had met Putin “one time … a long time ago” and claimed that he “got along with him great.”

10/2015: YES. “I think the biggest thing we have is that we were on 60 Minutes together and we had fantastic ratings.”

11/2015: YES. Trump claimed he had gotten to know Putin “very well because we were both on 60 Minutes”.

2/2016: NO.  “I have no relationship with him other than he called me a genius. He said Donald Trump is a genius…”

7/ 2016: NO. “I never met Putin. I don’t know who Putin is. He said one nice thing about me. He said I’m a genius. I said, ‘Thank you very much’ to the newspaper, and that was the end of it. I never met Putin.”

7/2016: NO. “I have no relationship to — with him (Putin). I have no relationship with him.”

1/2017: NO.  “Russia has never tried to use leverage over me. I HAVE NOTHING TO DO WITH RUSSIA – NO DEALS, NO LOANS, NO NOTHING!”

So, which is it? 

Pat Molloy
Marco Island