WASHINGTON >> At least one thing is known about the meeting between presidents Donald Trump and Vladimir Putin: They met.

But for the first time? Or again? Depends on which accounts from Trump you choose to believe.

At home and abroad over the past week, the U.S. president made a number of assertions at odds with reality, about the stock market, the “blazing” economy, NATO and more. But the curious lack of clarity on his personal history with the Russian leader perhaps stood out.

Here’s a look at his statements on that subject over time, and a variety of other assertions in recent days:

TRUMP, in a chronological mashup of statements from 2013 to 2016 on whether he had met Putin: “I met him once.” “Yes. One time, yes. Long time ago. Got along with him great, by the way.” ‘’I got to know him very well because we were both on ‘60 Minutes,’ we were stablemates.” ‘’I never met Putin. I don’t know who Putin is.” ‘’I don’t think I’ve ever met him. I mean if he’s in the same room or something. But I don’t think so.” ‘’I didn’t meet him. I haven’t spent time with him. I didn’t have dinner with him. I didn’t go hiking with him. I don’t know — and I wouldn’t know him from Adam except I see his picture and I would know what he looks like.”

PUTIN: “I am very happy to meet you, Mr. President.” — remarks in a brief, public portion of their meeting Friday.

THE FACTS: We don’t know. But there is no public record of a prior private meeting.

Trump initially claimed to have met Putin during business meetings in Russia or when he owned the Miss Universe beauty pageant, which was held in Moscow in 2013. As a foreign policy neophyte, he found it advantageous before his presidential campaign and during the early part of it to claim a relationship with Putin, to show he had the right stuff to deal with a world leader. When he risked appearing too close to Putin later in the campaign, he changed his story.

This much is known: Trump and Putin were only “60 Minutes” ‘’stablemates” because they were on the same program. Trump’s segment was taped in New York; Putin’s in Russia.

TRUMP, on whether Russia interfered in the 2016 U.S. elections: “Nobody really knows.” He added: “So, it was Russia, and I think it was probably others also.” — news conference in Poland on Thursday.

NIKKI HALEY, U.S. ambassador to the U.N.: “Everybody knows that Russia meddled in our elections.” — on CNN’s “State of the Union,” taped for broadcast Sunday.

THE FACTS: The weight of evidence supports Haley’s certainty more than her boss’ equivocation. Multiple U.S. intelligence agencies have concluded that Russia meddled in the campaign, and for the purpose of giving Trump an advantage over Democrat Hillary Clinton. The full scope of the interference has not been established, nor whether Russian officials colluded with Trump associates in the campaign.

White House officials said Trump confronted Putin about the interference in their private meeting Friday. Kremlin officials had a different account, saying Trump appeared accepting of Putin’s denials that Moscow did anything untoward to shape the election.

In Poland, Trump argued alternately that it could have been Russia, probably was Russia and indeed was Russia, while insisting it could have been other countries, too, and adding: “I won’t be specific.”

TRUMP: “No matter where you look, the economy is blazing. And on every front we’re doing well. And we do have challenges, but we will handle those challenges — believe me.” — remarks at Fourth of July event at White House.

TRUMP: “Really great numbers on jobs & the economy! Things are starting to kick in now, and we have just begun! Don’t like steel & aluminum dumping!” — tweet Monday.

THE FACTS: The economy is not blazing. At best, it’s at a controlled burn.

The performance under Trump has been remarkably close to the relatively tepid growth under President Barack Obama, a record Trump criticized as a candidate. Most economists agree that any president is unlikely to suddenly transform an economy in a matter of months.

The economy grew at a sluggish annual pace of 1.4 percent during the first three months of the year. Growth can be uneven on a quarterly basis. But Federal Reserve officials estimate the economy will grow 2.2 percent this year, 2.1 percent in 2018 and 1.9 percent in 2019. That is pretty close to growth of roughly 2 percent during the recovery under Obama.

Trump can celebrate a 4.4 percent unemployment rate, but that builds on progress made during Obama’s tenure. The lower unemployment rate has also translated into smaller job gains under Trump.

Monthly job growth has averaged 180,000 during the first six months of 2017, compared with an average of more than 186,000 last year, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics.

TRUMP: “Dow hit a new intraday all-time high! I wonder whether or not the Fake News Media will so report?” — tweet Monday.

THE FACTS: Peaks and valleys during the day generally don’t make for screaming headlines. Investors generally pay more attention to where stock market indexes stand when trading ends at 4 p.m. Because those markets have been setting records for months, Monday’s intraday peak wasn’t that notable, though the financial media reported on it. The stock market has been rising under Trump’s watch, as it rose under Obama’s since 2013.

TRUMP: “When I say that the stock market is at an all-time high, we’ve picked up in market value almost $4 trillion since Nov. 8, which was the election. $4 trillion — it’s a lot of money. Personally, I picked up nothing, but that’s all right. Everyone else is getting rich. That’s OK. I’m very happy. “ — Energy meeting with European leaders in Warsaw on Thursday.

THE FACTS: Everyone else is not getting rich. Most Americans lack meaningful stock market investments. Research by New York University economist Edward Wolff found that just 10 percent of the U.S. population owns 80 percent of stock market wealth.

Also, it’s likely the rising stock market has indeed benefited him personally. Financial disclosures show the president has multiple brokerage accounts and extensive stock holdings. He owns shares in Apple Inc. (up 24 percent year-to-date), Caterpillar Inc. (up 15 percent) and Microsoft Corp. (up nearly 12 percent) among other companies. Even if Trump didn’t buy into the recent stock market gains, his existing shares probably received a boost.

TRUMP, on NATO’s core pledge: “To those who would criticize our tough stance, I would point out that the United States has demonstrated not merely with words but with its actions that we stand firmly behind Article 5, the mutual defense commitment.” — speech in Warsaw on Thursday.

THE FACTS: Rather than showing a commitment with his actions, Trump has sown confusion with his words. Article 5 has only been used once — by other NATO members, to come to the defense of the U.S. after the 2001 terrorist attacks.

Trump suggested during the campaign that NATO members lagging on their own military spending might not be able to count on the U.S. to come to their aid if attacked. And he pointedly did not endorse Article 5 at a NATO meeting in May, unnerving some allies. In June, though, he said: “I’m committing the United States to Article 5.” Those words won’t be tested with action until or unless a NATO member is attacked.

TRUMP: “We just approved a big pipeline also — the Keystone Pipeline. It was under consideration for many, many years, and it was dead, and I approved it in my first day of office.” — Warsaw energy meeting.

THE FACTS: He did not approve it on his first day in office. During his first week, on Jan. 24, Trump signed an order asking TransCanada to re-submit its application to build Keystone XL, which had been blocked by Obama. Trump suggested at the time that more negotiations would be required with TransCanada before he would approve the project. The project actually got the go-ahead in late March.

TRUMP: “Americans know that a strong alliance of free, sovereign and independent nations is the best defense for our freedoms and for our interests. That is why my administration has demanded that all members of NATO finally meet their full and fair financial obligation. As a result of this insistence, billions of dollars more have begun to pour into NATO. In fact, people are shocked. But billions and billions of dollars more coming in from countries that, in my opinion, would not have been paying so quickly.” — Warsaw speech.

THE FACTS: The notion of money pouring into NATO because of his tough talk is one of Trump’s most frequent fictions. The actual issue is how much NATO countries spend on their own military budgets. They agreed in 2014, well before he became president, to stop cutting military spending, and have honored that. They also agreed then to a goal of moving “toward” spending 2 percent of their gross domestic product on their own defense by 2024. Most are short of that and the target is not ironclad. His tough talk is aimed at nudging them toward that goal.</s>President Donald Trump did what he had to do: He confronted Vladimir Putin about the issue of Russian interference in last year’s U.S. elections during his much-anticipated first meeting with the Russian president.

Under intense pressure to do so from his Democratic opponents and even some fellow Republicans, Trump would have been pilloried even before he got home from his European trip had he not broached the subject.

The president can now point to the Putin meeting when challenged on whether he’s been tough enough on the Russians.

But it’s still to be seen how forcefully Trump will deal with the issue going forward to prevent future meddling and to ensure consequences for what’s already occurred.

“If anything, we’ve seen Russia continue to pursue similar tactics in the French election. If anything, it feels to be intensifying, and if we now say we’re done with this, we are not adequately protecting our country,” said Heather Conley, a Europe expert at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, a Washington think tank.

Without knowing exactly what Trump said to Putin on the issue during in their two-hours-plus meeting, it’s hard to know whether Trump’s approach toward to the matter has shifted significantly.

U.S. Secretary of State Rex Tillerson, who sat in on the meeting and briefed journalists afterward, said Trump opened the session by “raising the concerns of the American people regarding Russian interference in the 2016 election.”

Trump pressed Putin on the matter more than once, Tillerson said. Putin, in turn, denied involvement and asked for proof.

“The fact that the issue came up should not be a surprise,” said Derek Chollet, a former Obama administration official and senior adviser for security and defense policy at the German Marshall Fund in Washington, adding that it “would have been a shock had the issue not come up.”

What matters, Chollet said, are the specifics of what the two presidents discussed about election meddling, the points Trump agreed or disagreed with, and how much Putin dominated the conversation.

Tillerson said the leaders agreed to work together on staying out of each other’s elections processes.

But Trump has sent mixed signals about how seriously he regards the matter.

Deeply frustrated by the suggestion that his 2016 victory may have been tainted, Trump has held back from fully endorsed the findings of multiple U.S. intelligence agencies that Russia meddled in last year’s presidential election to help him win.

Just Thursday, the day before he and Putin met, Trump leveled his latest critique of America’s intelligence apparatus while standing on Polish soil, waffling on whether Russia was involved and saying that Moscow was probably behind the meddling but that other countries may be guilty, too.

“Nobody really knows,” he said.

Trump has tried to shift the focus away from what steps he will take to safeguard U.S. elections to what then-President Barack Obama did after he was briefed before the election about what Russia was up to. Trump has alleged that Obama didn’t do anything to stop Russia because he expected Democrat Hillary Clinton to win anyway. Obama, for his part, has said that he confronted Putin about the issue when they were at an international conference last year and told the Russian to knock it off.

Tillerson said Trump and Putin are “rightly” focused on moving relations between their countries forward from what he called an “intractable disagreement.”

But U.S. Sen. Mark Warner, a Virginia Democrat and vice chairman of the Senate intelligence committee, said that whatever Trump told Putin would have carried more weight if the president hadn’t “equivocated” about who was behind the election interference.

“It would also have had more force if he had not again criticized the integrity of our intelligence agencies, among whom there is unwavering agreement about Russia’s active interference in the 2016 U.S. presidential election,” Warner said.

Thomas Wright, a senior fellow and director of the U.S.-Europe center at the Brookings Institution, said the Trump administration hasn’t shown itself to be sincere about wanting to prevent future attacks and has shown a determination to build a partnership with Russia, despite the worries of some European allies who fear Moscow’s aggressive tactics.

“They’re basically checking the box on certain things they feel like they’ll get in trouble if they don’t do,” Wright said.

Trump will get some credit for raising the elections issue with Putin. But he still has plenty of convincing to do regarding his resolve in standing up to the Russians.

EDITOR’S NOTE — Darlene Superville has covered the White House for The Associated Press since 2009.

Associated Press writer Josh Lederman in Washington contributed to this report.</s>Image copyright Reuters Image caption Donald Trump and Vladimir Putin had their first face-to-face talks on Friday

Donald Trump has backtracked on a proposal to work with Russia to create an "impenetrable" cybersecurity unit to prevent election hacking.

Hours after promoting the idea on Sunday, the US president said that he did not think it could actually happen.

The idea of a partnership with Russia was ridiculed by senior Republicans.

It comes after Mr Trump's first face-to-face talks with Russian President Vladimir Putin in Germany on Friday, in which the pair discussed the issue.

Mr Trump described the outcome of the talks as positive and suggested closer co-operation between the two nations.

"Putin and I discussed forming an impenetrable cybersecurity unit so that election hacking, and many other negative things, will be guarded and safe," he said.

The initial proposal immediately prompted derision from Democrats, as well as some Republicans who questioned why the US would work with Russia after the Kremlin's alleged meddling in the 2016 US election.

Mr Trump shifted his position on Sunday night.

"The fact that President Putin and I discussed a cybersecurity unit doesn't mean I think it can happen. It can't," he tweeted.

However, he stressed that another issue discussed in his talks with Mr Putin, a ceasefire in south-western Syria, had come into effect.

Treasury Secretary Steve Mnuchin had sought to defend the proposed cyber unit after Mr Trump's initial announcement.

Speaking on ABC's This Week programme, he described it as a "significant accomplishment" for Mr Trump.

"What we want to make sure is that we co-ordinate with Russia," he added.

However, Republican Senator Marco Rubio suggested that such an initiative would be like partnering with Syrian President Bashar al-Assad on chemical weapons.

Republican Senator Lindsey Graham said: "It's not the dumbest idea I've ever heard, but it's pretty close."

Media playback is unsupported on your device Media caption Trump to Putin: "It's an honour to be with you"

A special prosecutor is investigating whether Trump associates colluded with alleged Russian efforts to influence the 2016 US election.

Both Mr Trump and Mr Putin said the allegations had been discussed.

However, the two sides described the content of the meeting differently.

Mr Trump said he "strongly pressed" the issue with Mr Putin, who had "vehemently denied" interfering in the US election.

He also said it was time to work more "constructively" with Russia.

President Putin said he believed President Trump had accepted his assurances that Moscow had not interfered in the vote.

However, US Secretary of State Rex Tillerson said interference in the 2016 election remained an impediment to better relations with Russia, while the US ambassador to the UN, Nikki Haley, said the US "can't trust Russia" and "won't ever trust Russia".</s>For a president who lies more than any of his predecessors — even Lyndon Johnson and Richard Nixon! — Donald Trump can also be candid to a fault. Recall how, after firing FBI Director James Comey, he blew apart the administration spin that this had nothing to do with any investigation of the Trump campaign by openly admitting that he acted because of the “Russia thing.” Now he’s done it again.

Trump’s aides claimed that he was tough on Vladimir Putin during their meeting in Hamburg, Germany. Secretary of State Rex Tillerson said Trump “pressed President Putin on more than one occasion regarding Russian involvement.” Anonymous U.S. officials denied Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov’s assertions that Trump had “accepted” Putin’s false assurances that Russia was not behind the hacking and leaking of Democratic Party documents last year.

And then on Sunday morning Trump took to Twitter to essentially confirm what Lavrov said: “I strongly pressed President Putin twice about Russian meddling in our election. He vehemently denied it. I've already given my opinion.....” Yes, he did: In Warsaw, the day before his meeting with Putin, Trump opined, as he has many times before, “I think it could very well have been Russia, but I think it could well have been other countries…. Nobody really knows. Nobody really knows for sure.”

This is, as the British say, bollocks. We do know for sure: the FBI, CIA, NSA and the Office of the Director of National Intelligence issued a unanimous “high confidence” assessment in January that Russia was behind the hacking last year, and that its intent was to hurt Hillary Clinton and to help Donald Trump. Trump’s misleading assertions that it was “three or four” intelligence agencies, not all 17, are meaningless, because there was no dissent from the other intelligence agencies. And, as former Director of National Intelligence James Clapper said, “We saw no evidence whatsoever that it was anyone involved in this other than the Russians.”

Yet, despite all evidence to the contrary, Trump refuses to accept reality. In Hamburg, he even discussed with Putin an Alice-in-Wonderland proposal of forming a joint American-Russian “Cyber Security unit so that election hacking, & many other negative things, will be guarded.” As Sen. John McCain noted sarcastically on Sunday, “I am sure that Vladimir Putin could be of enormous assistance in that effort since he’s doing the hacking.” The idea is so inane that by the end of the day even Trump had disowned it, leaving his Treasury secretary, Steve Mnuchin, who had loyally called the cyber-security partnership “a very significant accomplishment for the president,” twisting in the wind.

Trump’s denial of Russian election-meddling is all the more startling when contrasted with his reckless promulgation of baseless claims that millions of illegal ballots were cast in the presidential election. There is not an iota of evidence to support this assertion. It is an entirely imaginary scandal manufactured by Trump because his fragile psyche can’t handle the fact that Hillary Clinton won more popular votes than he did.

Yet Trump is pursuing nonexistent evidence of wrongdoing with all the powers at his disposal, setting up a voter fraud commission, headed by Kansas Secretary of State Kris Kobach, that is itself fraudulent. Pretty much every state has declined to share voter information with this politically motivated commission because doing so would violate voters’ privacy and could open the way to genuine large-scale fraud — imagine if hackers could break into a single database containing all of the nation’s voter information.

How to explain the discrepancy, with Trump ignoring a real scandal and doggedly pursuing a phony one? The answer is pretty simple: Trump doesn’t care a whit about the national interest. All he cares about is his self-interest.

He is hardly ignorant of Russian machinations. Even before receiving the full intelligence briefings on what the Russians did —and it appears that the intelligence community has proof that Putin personally ordered the election meddling — he showed his awareness of the Russian role in July 2016 when he called on the Kremlin to hack Hillary Clinton’s emails. This is what the lawyers call “guilty knowledge.”

But Trump isn’t mad about this assault on American democracy because he was its beneficiary. He is only mad that the “fake news” media, his political opponents and special counsel Robert Mueller continue to probe the Russian role. The most benign explanation is that Trump is worried that such investigations undermine his political legitimacy. The more sinister explanation is that he is worried that collusion between his campaign and the Kremlin will be exposed — something that appears more likely after the new revelation that Donald Trump Jr. met with a Russian lawyer to seek dirt on Hillary Clinton. Either way, the president is not treating this with the seriousness that an attack on our democracy deserves.</s>Not long ago, the writer Peter Beinart offered an interesting idea about our 45th president: “Someone should write a novel in which he runs and wins as a Democrat.” Underpinning this suggestion, of course, is the highly probable possibility that at one point or another the ideologically ambidextrous Donald Trump contemplated just such a scenario.

It’s a fascinating thought experiment: Could Trump have done to the Democrats in 2016 what he did to the Republicans? Why not? There, too, he would have challenged an overconfident, message-challenged establishment candidate (Hillary Clinton instead of Jeb Bush) and with an even smaller number of other competitors to dispatch. One could easily see him doing as well or better than Bernie Sanders—surprising Clinton in the Iowa caucuses, winning the New Hampshire primaries, and on and on. More to the point, many of Trump’s views—skepticism on trade, sympathetic to Planned Parenthood, opposition to the Iraq war, a focus on blue-collar workers in Rust Belt America—seemed to gel as well, if not better, with blue-state America than red. Think the Democrats wouldn’t tolerate misogynist rhetoric and boorish behavior from their leaders? Well, then you’ve forgotten about Woodrow Wilson and John F. Kennedy and LBJ and the last President Clinton.

There are, as with every what-if scenario, some flaws. Democrats would have deeply resented Trump’s ‘birther’ questioning of Barack Obama’s origins, and would have been highly skeptical of the former reality TV star’s political bona fides even if he hadn’t made a sharp turn to the right as he explored a presidential bid in the run up to the 2012 election. His comments on women and minorities would have exposed him to withering scrutiny among the left’s army of advocacy groups. Liberal donors would likely have banded together to strangle his candidacy in its cradle—if they weren’t laughing him off. But Republican elites tried both of these strategies in 2015, as well, and it manifestly didn’t work. What’s more, Trump did once hold a passel of progressive stances—and he had friendships all over the political map. As Bloomberg’s Josh Green notes, in his Apprentice days, Trump was even wildly popular among minorities. It’s not entirely crazy to imagine him outflanking a coronation-minded Hillary Clinton on the left and blitzing a weak Democratic field like General Sherman marching through Georgia. And besides, it’s fun to think about.

So how, in fact, might history have changed if Trump descended that infamous golden escalator and declared his candidacy for the Democratic nomination? And how would it be (depressingly) the same? 

 Below: a guess at some of key moments from the first six months of the presidency of Donald J. Trump, Democrat:

In a star-studded celebrity Inauguration, where attendees include Cher, Madonna, Oprah and Ellen DeGeneres, President Trump offers stirring praise to his predecessors. “We are grateful to President Obama and First Lady Michelle Obama for their gracious aid throughout this transition. They have been magnificent,” he says—and with rhetoric that seem squarely aimed at the Republican leadership, slams “a small group in our nation’s capital that has reaped the rewards of government while the people have borne the cost.” Republicans criticize the speech for its “angry, bitter tone.” Former President George W. Bush is heard remarking, “That was some weird shit,” a comment that MSNBC’s Chris Matthews calls “outrageous” and “disrespectful.”

Republican Senators John McCain and Lindsey Graham appear on Fox News to discuss “widespread reports” that the Russian government attempted to interfere in the U.S. election process in favor of President Trump. Media Matters’ David Brock calls the charge “a fringe conspiracy theory advanced by a bunch of sore losers who have now lost three elections in a row.” TIME magazine mocks the charge with a cover showing Vladimir Putin on horseback waving a hammer and sickle and the headline, “THE RUSSIANS ARE COMING: Inside the Next Vast Right-wing Conspiracy.”

At a steel plant outside of Pittsburgh, with Secretary of State Joe Biden beaming at his side, President Trump signs an executive order announcing the United States will withdraw from the Trans-Pacific Partnership trade agreement. He wins praise from union leaders and Vermont Senator Bernie Sanders, who commends his former primary opponent “for absolutely doing the right thing to protect the American worker.” Republican leaders slam the administration for an “unfree trade” policy that is a “bum deal” for American workers—but President Trump calls them “heartless bastards who have been outsourcing American jobs to China for decades.” In a clip shared on Twitter by former British MP Louise Mensch, RT host Ed Schultz hails the move as a “political masterstroke.”

President Trump signs an executive order to build a LEED-certified wall between the United States and Mexico, complete with solar panels and micro-housing units made of recycled shipping containers. House Democratic leader Nancy Pelosi tells reporters that while she personally has concerns about the cost of the plan, “the American people have spoken on this subject relatively recently” and that she hopes it will raise wages for struggling farm workers. The New York Daily News editorializes that “the wall may well keep America safer.” Speaker of the House Paul Ryan, already a frontrunner to challenge Trump in 2020, denounces the plan as “too expensive, nonsensical, and it just plain won’t work.”

President Trump signs an executive order placing a temporary ban on travel from seven predominately Muslin countries. White House Chief of Staff Ron Klain appears on Rachel Maddow’s show to point out that the Trump provision is simply built on a list of problematic counterterrorism partners put together during the Obama-Biden administration. Former members of the Obama administration also express qualified support, though a few holdovers gripe anonymously to the press. There are no nationwide demonstrations reported anywhere.

As he settles into his new White House digs, President Trump issues a 3 a.m. tweet against Fox News that alarms conservative pundits: “Rightwing media peddling LIES. May be time to rein in.” Trump’s comment, and subsequent reference to the so-called Fairness Doctrine to regulate the airwaves, dominates coverage on Fox News, The Blaze, Rush Limbaugh and Breitbart, but receives only muted criticism from First Amendment advocates. A Harvard Law professor opines in The New York Times, “Maybe it is time to rein in the right.”

Tweeting that Judge Merrick Garland was “a low-energy snooze,” President Trump formally nominates Michelle Obama to the United States Supreme Court to replace the late Antonin Scalia. To gasps from White House reporters, a smiling Trump says, “How do you like this? Aren’t you surprised?” He extols the former first lady as “a really tremendous person who calls it like she sees it.” The selection wins universal praise from mainstream media outlets. “I can’t believe I’m saying this,” Rosie O’Donnell gushes on Twitter, “but this is the best decision any president has made since Lincoln.” “I couldn’t be prouder,” says former President Obama. “But I guess this means when Michelle tells me to take out the garbage, it carries a little more weight now.” Gallup registers Trump’s approval rating at 53 percent.

Melania Trump is warmly welcomed to the set of The View, where the hosts take turns praising the first lady for her fashion sense, ability to speak multiple languages and “humanizing” effect on the president. “She’s the most glamorous first lady since Jackie Kennedy,” says Joy Behar. Copies of a special edition of People magazine focused on the First Family fly off the shelves at Whole Foods and the Park Slope Co-op.

House Republican leaders hold a press conference announcing that they will appoint a special committee to investigate reports of Russian interference in the 2016 election. Calling the exercise a “waste of taxpayer funds,” Democrats at first refuse to staff any of the committee slots, but later relent by giving Virginia Senator Mark Warner what Virginia Gov. Terry McAuliffe calls the “thankless” task of “humoring” the GOP. Only Fox News covers the press conference live. In one of her first public appearances since her shocking defeat in the Democratic primaries, Hillary Clinton says that Russian interference is a “serious issue” but doubts Republican investigative efforts are sincere. “I know something about vast right-wing conspiracies, right?” she asks to laughter during a CNN town hall.

Senate Republicans are roundly mocked in editorial pages across America for their “all-night” filibuster of Labor secretary nominee Elizabeth Warren. She ultimately is confirmed by a vote of 51-50, with Vice President Sherrod Brown breaking the 50/50 tie in the Senate.

At the Academy Awards, Meryl Streep wins applause by denouncing Republicans for their “ongoing war” against women and minorities and for their outright hostility to the new administration. “It is time that we as Americans put aside bitter divides and stand with our president, who is standing up for women and union workers and artists,” she says to applause. “Otherwise all we are left with is football and mixed martial arts, which are not the arts.” President Trump tweets his approval: “I agree with my good friend Meryl Streep, the GREATEST ACTRESS OF ALL TIME.”

President Trump gives a widely acclaimed speech to a joint meeting of Congress, winning praise from pundits on CNN, MSNBC and even Fox, which has been more critical. (“This is the day he became president,” gushes a momentarily impressed Sean Hannity.) At an earlier lunch with Bill Clinton, the former praised the man who defeated his wife and said, “All Americans have an obligation to give him a chance to lead.” Conservative websites note the prolonged looks the former president appears to give to First Lady Melania Trump; one viral GIF created by a Reddit user seems to show Bubba checking out her décolletage.

After conferring with Warren Buffet and congressional Democrats, Trump proposes a tax-cut plan that lowers taxes for middle class Americans while raising taxes on the rich. The New York Times editorial board calls the plan “sensible and essential.” Vox writer Matthew Yglesias praises the provision closing the carried-interest loophole as “a long-overdue FU to the hedge-fund crowd,” but criticizes the effect the border-adjustment tax would have on low-wage retail workers as overly regressive.

Republican leaders in Congress pass an Obamacare repeal bill, calling on Trump to honor his promises to change the legislation, which he once called a “total disaster.” The president, saying he’s “heard many, many good things” about the law he once derided, says he will not support a repeal plan. First daughter Ivanka Trump, who is said to be considering an informal role as a White House czar on women in the workforce, is said to have played a key role in persuading the president to take a more moderate stance. Conservative leaders, most notably Pat Robertson and Oral Roberts, Jr., lash out at the “devilish” influences at the White House, winning widespread condemnation in the media.

Macy’s announces that Ivanka Trump’s jewelry collection will be expanded in all of its stores. The news comes as the Trump hotel chain announces record occupancy with prominent celebrities booking events at Trump hotels to show “solidarity” with his progressive agenda. Richard Painter, a former ethics lawyer in the George W. Bush White House, says it’s not a problem as the president “cannot have a conflict of interest.”

Bill O’Reilly teases that he has received copies of President Trump’s tax returns that he will release on air that evening. The stunt is widely derided by media critics in the Washington Post and New York Times, with some suggesting that the Fox News host broke the law. The Late Show’s Stephen Colbert devotes half of an entire episode to an elaborate parody mocking his longtime punching bag for the lengthy windup to what amounts to just one year’s worth of tax data.

Trump tweets in defense of Hillary Clinton, who continues to receive bruising criticism from former aides in the press. “HRC ran tough campaign and is good friend. We are making America great again together!” E.J. Dionne, appearing on PBS NewsHour, speculates that he’s just trying to “keep her inside the tent” and fend off a possible primary challenge in 2020.

President Trump’s decision to donate his first salary to Planned Parenthood receives scathing treatment from conservative columnists such as Bill Kristol. It is roundly praised on MSNBC, where host Joy Reid favorably compares Trump to Kennedy and FDR – “wealthy men who put the needs of the working man and woman ahead of themselves.” A guerrilla journalist threatens to release a clip of the president walking into an abortion clinic.

In his first extended interview since leaving office, President Obama offers words of support for his successor. “He’s gone through a tough learning curve, and he’s handling it well,” Obama says. He adds that he was looking forward to watching his wife get sworn in as the new associate justice of the Supreme Court, acknowledging that Trump used “all of the skills he learned in ‘The Art of the Deal’ to persuade Michelle to take the job.” SCOTUSblog speculates that Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg will step down at the end of the current Supreme Court term, and Emily’s List quietly begins circulating the names of acceptable replacements.

In a pre-Easter visit at the Vatican, Pope Francis greets President and Mrs. Trump with a broad smile and extends the scheduled meeting by 30 minutes. A Vatican spokesman later reports that the Holy Father was heartened by Trump’s expressed commitment to listen carefully to his advisors and global leaders on the “essential duty” of combating climate change. In remarks to reporters later that day, the president seems to undercut this by saying he’s worried about the effect the Paris accord could have on the ‘Better Deal’ jobs program he is developing with Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer. “I could go either way, frankly,” he says.

Ending a week of “will he or won’t he” speculation, and numerous visits to the White House from Hollywood celebrities, President Trump announces that the United States will stay in the Paris accord. He cites “very interesting conversations” with Presidents Obama, Clinton, Pope Francis and Leonardo DiCaprio in making his decision.

President Trump receives a standing ovation at the White House Correspondents Dinner, even as conservative publications and outlets announce boycott the event to protest the administration’s refusal to answer questions on the Russia scandal. In remarks that draw bipartisan praise, WHCA President Jeff Mason criticizes the White House for excluding certain conservative websites from its daily briefings.

A study by Harvard’s Shorenstein Center on Media, Politics and Public Policy is released on media coverage of President Trump’s first 100 days. The study finds that coverage of the Trump administration was largely positive on most networks, but overwhelmingly negative on one network, Fox, by a margin of 85-15 percent.

Comedian Kathy Griffin makes waves in a stunt that goes viral, by having herself delivered to the White House by Federal Express in a gift box addressed to President and Mrs. Trump. “I wanted to think of a dramatic way to express my affection and support for the new first couple who have done so much for reproductive rights and the rights of gay Americans since taking office,” she tells Entertainment Tonight.

Blaming “alleged” conservative news outlets for causing the GOP’s third consecutive loss for the White House by supporting Republican “establishment candidates,” a consortium of billionaires launch plans for a new cable network to more vigorously challenge Trump.

On a panel at the former Republican nominee’s annual summit in Park City, Utah, Mitt Romney and “Hillbilly Elegy” author J.D. Vance discuss the GOP’s problems attracting white working-class voters, who went overwhelmingly for Trump in November. They announce they are writing a book together on the subject. Liberal pundits lambaste Romney on Twitter, with New York magazine’s Jonathan Chait scoffing, “Mitt ‘Bain Capital’ Romney is going to figure out how to win over the WWC? LOL.”

A study by the Media Research Center faults the major media networks for ignoring coverage of the Russia investigation. The report singles out CNN for devoting only 2 percent of its coverage of the administration to reports of Russian collusion.

Democratic leader Nancy Pelosi sidesteps a flurry of criticism the president has received for a tweet about MSNBC host Mika Brzezinski’s personal appearance. Acknowledging that the comments were “in poor taste,” Pelosi adds, “Look at our party’s agenda. It’s about empowering women. And the president supports that 100 percent.”

President Trump holds his first one-on-one meeting with Russian President Vladimir Putin. Democrats praise the president for “trying to reset the reset” in U.S.-Russian relations after some tense years under Obama. Republicans, led by McCain and Graham, urge Trump to confront Putin over Russia’s alleged interference in the elections. The 2016 Republican nominee, Jeb Bush, declines to comment. “I’m just trying to get the Marlins in fighting shape for next year,” he says, stroking a lengthy beard.</s>At least one thing is known about the meeting between presidents Donald Trump and Vladimir Putin: They met.

But for the first time? Or again? Depends on which accounts from Trump you choose to believe.

At home and abroad over the past week, the U.S. president made a number of assertions at odds with reality, about the stock market, the "blazing" economy, NATO and more. But the curious lack of clarity on his personal history with the Russian leader perhaps stood out.

Here's a look at his statements on that subject over time, and a variety of other assertions in recent days:

TRUMP, in a chronological mashup of statements from 2013 to 2016 on whether he had met Putin: "I met him once." "Yes. One time, yes. Long time ago. Got along with him great, by the way." ''I got to know him very well because we were both on '60 Minutes,' we were stablemates." ''I never met Putin. I don't know who Putin is." ''I don't think I've ever met him. I mean if he's in the same room or something. But I don't think so." ''I didn't meet him. I haven't spent time with him. I didn't have dinner with him. I didn't go hiking with him. I don't know — and I wouldn't know him from Adam except I see his picture and I would know what he looks like."

PUTIN: "I never met with him." — June, NBC interview.

PUTIN: "I am very happy to meet you, Mr. President." — remarks in a brief, public portion of their meeting Friday.

THE FACTS: We don't know. But there is no public record of a prior private meeting.

Trump initially claimed to have met Putin during business meetings in Russia or when he owned the Miss Universe beauty pageant, which was held in Moscow in 2013. As a foreign policy neophyte, he found it advantageous before his presidential campaign and during the early part of it to claim a relationship with Putin, to show he had the right stuff to deal with a world leader. When he risked appearing too close to Putin later in the campaign, he changed his story.

This much is known: Trump and Putin were only "60 Minutes" ''stablemates" because they were on the same program. Trump's segment was taped in New York; Putin's in Russia.

TRUMP, on whether Russia interfered in the 2016 U.S. elections: "Nobody really knows." He added: "So, it was Russia, and I think it was probably others also." — news conference in Poland on Thursday.

NIKKI HALEY, U.S. ambassador to the U.N.: "Everybody knows that Russia meddled in our elections." — on CNN's "State of the Union," taped for broadcast Sunday.

THE FACTS: The weight of evidence supports Haley's certainty more than her boss' equivocation. Multiple U.S. intelligence agencies have concluded that Russia meddled in the campaign, and for the purpose of giving Trump an advantage over Democrat Hillary Clinton. The full scope of the interference has not been established, nor whether Russian officials colluded with Trump associates in the campaign.

White House officials said Trump confronted Putin about the interference in their private meeting Friday. Kremlin officials had a different account, saying Trump appeared accepting of Putin's denials that Moscow did anything untoward to shape the election.

In Poland, Trump argued alternately that it could have been Russia, probably was Russia and indeed was Russia, while insisting it could have been other countries, too, and adding: "I won't be specific."

TRUMP: "No matter where you look, the economy is blazing. And on every front we're doing well. And we do have challenges, but we will handle those challenges — believe me." — remarks at Fourth of July event at White House.

TRUMP: "Really great numbers on jobs & the economy! Things are starting to kick in now, and we have just begun! Don't like steel & aluminum dumping!" — tweet Monday.

THE FACTS: The economy is not blazing. At best, it's at a controlled burn.

The performance under Trump has been remarkably close to the relatively tepid growth under President Barack Obama, a record Trump criticized as a candidate. Most economists agree that any president is unlikely to suddenly transform an economy in a matter of months.

The economy grew at a sluggish annual pace of 1.4 percent during the first three months of the year. Growth can be uneven on a quarterly basis. But Federal Reserve officials estimate the economy will grow 2.2 percent this year, 2.1 percent in 2018 and 1.9 percent in 2019. That is pretty close to growth of roughly 2 percent during the recovery under Obama.

Trump can celebrate a 4.4 percent unemployment rate, but that builds on progress made during Obama's tenure. The lower unemployment rate has also translated into smaller job gains under Trump.

Monthly job growth has averaged 180,000 during the first six months of 2017, compared with an average of more than 186,000 last year, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics.

TRUMP: "Dow hit a new intraday all-time high! I wonder whether or not the Fake News Media will so report?" — tweet Monday.

THE FACTS: Peaks and valleys during the day generally don't make for screaming headlines. Investors generally pay more attention to where stock market indexes stand when trading ends at 4 p.m. Because those markets have been setting records for months, Monday's intraday peak wasn't that notable, though the financial media reported on it. The stock market has been rising under Trump's watch, as it rose under Obama's since 2013.

TRUMP: "When I say that the stock market is at an all-time high, we've picked up in market value almost $4 trillion since Nov. 8, which was the election. $4 trillion — it's a lot of money. Personally, I picked up nothing, but that's all right. Everyone else is getting rich. That's OK. I'm very happy. " — Energy meeting with European leaders in Warsaw on Thursday.

THE FACTS: Everyone else is not getting rich. Most Americans lack meaningful stock market investments. Research by New York University economist Edward Wolff found that just 10 percent of the U.S. population owns 80 percent of stock market wealth.</s>So yesterday a wily former KGB agent got over two hours to have a crack at a simpleton who knows the nation’s most prized state secrets. What could go wrong?

Stephen Hayes at the Weekly Standard says, a lot went wrong. Indeed, he says that Trump caved to Putin yesterday.

Hayes complains that Trump let Russia skate entirely on its efforts to interfere with the United States presidential election. But where Hayes really hits home is in his criticism of the meeting as it related to Syria:

The embarrassment wasn’t limited to interference in U.S. elections. There was Syria, too, where Tillerson claimed that American and Russian “objectives are exactly the same.” It is absurd to claim that our objectives in Syria—where the United States has called for the end of the Assad regime that Russia is supporting—are exactly the same. Forget being identical; in most cases, they aren’t even coincidental. [I]n April the U.S. government accused Russia of complicity in an unprovoked chemical weapons attack on innocent civilians. And on Friday, the secretary of State claimed that America and Russia have exactly the same objectives in Syria. And then Tillerson went even further. On matters where the United States and Russia have different views, he said, it may be that the Russians (who are actively backing a dictator slaughtering his own people) have got “the right approach and we’ve got the wrong approach.” Imagine for a moment the reaction from Republicans if John Kerry had made such a claim.

At PowerLine, Paul Mirengoff says that Hayes’s “Trump caved” characterization is “unfair.” I found Mirengoff’s argument less than fully convincing, though — especially this part:

Hayes also complains about what he thinks went down between Trump and Putin regarding Syria. He cites Tillerson’s statement that American and Russian “objectives are exactly the same.” The statement is, as Hayes says, absurd. But there’s little reason to think that Trump, or even Tillerson, believes it.

Color me skeptical when your argument is: don’t worry about the “absurd” thing our Secretary of State just said. Probably neither he nor the President actually believes it.

But there’s a ceasefire! Isn’t that a good thing? Sure — if you think Vladimir Putin is a honest fella. Garry Kasparov, who knows a thing or two about Putin, has this to say:

To Hayes’s analysis above, I would add the shameful spectacle of a man who has ordered journalists to be murdered pointing at a group of journalists and asking Trump: “These are the ones who insulted you?” Not only is this apparent confirmation of the prediction before the meeting that Trump would whine to Putin about “FAKE NEWS!!” but it is also, to put it mildly, creepy and chilling given Putin’s history. Putin might have Trumpers fooled — but he knows that at least some of the journalists know what Putin did to journalists like Anna Politkovskaya.

I know many will say: hey, but Trump said tough stuff and took tough action regarding Russia before the meeting. Well, sure. Trump is fundamentally a coward who caters to his audience. He talks about “radical Islamic terrorism” in Warsaw, but not Saudi Arabia. He says in Warsaw: “We treasure the rule of law and protect the right to free speech and free expression” — but when he speaks face to face with Putin, a man who kills journalists who engage in free speech and expression, he tells him he won’t meddle in Putin’s domestic affairs.

This cowardice sends a message to someone like Putin, who has sized up American leaders before. Putin determined that Bush and Obama were weaklings, and he has no doubt come to the same conclusion about Trump.

Expect aggression from Putin during Trump’s presidency. Yesterday’s meeting assured it.

[Cross-posted at RedState and The Jury Talks Back.]</s>The President will be called upon to rescue a Republican push to repeal Obamacare that now appears to be in significant trouble, and he is facing increasing fallout from his meeting with Russian President Vladimir Putin, which offered new openings to his critics.

But even as the turmoil deepens around his White House intensifies, Trump will only be home for a few days.

The President heads back to Europe later in the week to be the guest of honor at France's Bastille Day parade Friday on a trip that will paper over divisions between the White House and Western powers on display at the G20 summit. Trump was isolated on trade policy and was rebuked over his decision to pull the United States out of the Paris accord on combating climate change, although both positions were exactly in line with the promises he made to American voters that led to his victory in the 2016 presidential election.

Still, the visit will highlight Trump's increasing ease on the international stage after a visit last week in which he argued that the trajectory of the West should be closer to his nationalistic, populist politics than the more liberal reflexes on immigration and the reach of government that are favored by US allies across the Atlantic.

The most significant moment of Trump's journey to Germany and Poland, which ended when Air Force One touched down at Joint Base Andrews on Saturday night, was his long-awaited meeting with Putin. The encounter was lent added significance by the special counsel probe into whether Trump's campaign aides colluded with Moscow in election meddling. It came shortly before The New York Times reported that Trump's oldest son, Donald Trump Jr., son-in-law Jared Kushner, and then-campaign chairman Paul Manafort met with a Russian lawyer last year -- the first known meeting of several of the senior-most members of Trump's team and a Russian national during the campaign. The Times, which first reported on the previously undisclosed meeting, said Donald Trump Jr. was promised damaging information about Hillary Clinton before agreeing to meet with the Kremlin-connected lawyer during the 2016 campaign. The meeting took place at Trump Tower on June 9, 2016, the Times reported -- two weeks after Trump clinched the Republican presidential nomination. Trump Jr. said in a statement to CNN that he was not told the name of the person he was meeting with beforehand and told his brother-in-law and Manafort "nothing of the substance" when he invited them to attend. He added that his father "knew nothing of the meeting or these events." The explosive story promises to heighten the controversy over the collusion allegations and the President's meeting with Putin, which have hung over the White House's policy efforts. The administration has said the President made a "robust" effort to raise the issue of Russian election interference in his talks with the Russian president. But a dispute over what exactly was said erupted, after the talks on the sidelines of the G20 summit in Germany. Moscow said Trump accepted its arguments that it had not intervened in the election, a version of events the White House denies. "The President absolutely did not believe the denial of President Putin," White House chief of staff Reince Priebus said on Fox News Sunday. "What the President did is he immediately came into the meeting, talked about Russian meddling in the US election, went after that issue at least two separate times," Priebus said Republican Sen. Lindsey Graham, however, said that Trump's meeting with the Russian leader in Hamburg amounted to a serious error. "He had what I think is a disastrous meeting with President Putin," Graham said on NBC's "Meet the Press." The South Carolina Senator said that Secretary of State Rex Tillerson's statement that Trump "rightly" focused on how to move past election interference issues was misguided. "Tillerson and Trump are ready to forgive and forget when it comes to cyberattacks on the American election of 2016," he said. Trump also sought to shape the emerging narrative over the meeting, apparently seeking to rebut critics who argue that he was not sufficiently tough on the election meddling issue in the Putin showdown. "Putin & I discussed forming an impenetrable Cyber Security unit so that election hacking, & many other negative things, will be guarded," Trump tweeted on Sunday. While the Russian controversy deepens, the President may also be called into rescue the faltering push to repeal Obamacare, amid signs that discord in the Senate over the issue could derail a foundational Republican promise. The bill is one of the most unpopular pieces of legislation in years, and Republicans are struggling to bridge divides between conservatives, who say it doesn't go far enough to repeal the former President's signature health care law and moderates who fear they could pay a political price, if, as predicted by the Congressional Budget Office, the bill results in thousands of Americans losing access to health care. How GOP could make health care deal with Democrats The chances that the Republican dominated Senate will act on the bill appear to be receding by the hour. "My view is it's probably going to be dead, " Arizona Sen. John McCain said on CBS's "Face The Nation." "I fear that it's going to fail," he added. A failure to act on health care could have serious political consequences, saddling Republicans with the blame for not fixing the deficiencies of the current Obamacare system. It could also cause a backlash among grassroots GOP supporters who have sent successive Republican majorities to Washington on the rationale that they would repeal Obamacare.</s>Trump backtracks on US-Russia cyber unit, says it cannot happen

US President Donald Trump waves as walks on the South Lawn of the White House upon his return to Washington, from the G20 Summit in Hamburg, July 8, 2017. — Reuters picWASHINGTON, July 10 — US President Donald Trump this morning backtracked on his push for a cyber security unit with Russia, tweeting that he did not think it could happen, hours after his proposal was harshly criticised by Republicans who said Moscow could not be trusted.

Trump said on Twitter early yesterday that he and Russian President Vladimir Putin discussed on Friday forming “an impenetrable Cyber Security unit” to address issues like the risk of cyber meddling in elections.

The idea appeared to be a political non-starter. It was immediately scorned by several of Trump’s fellow Republicans, who questioned why the United States would work with Russia after Moscow’s alleged meddling in the 2016 US election.

“It’s not the dumbest idea I have ever heard but it’s pretty close,” Senator Lindsey Graham of South Carolina told NBC’s Meet the Press programme.

Ash Carter, who was US defense secretary until the end of former Democratic President Barack Obama’s administration in January, told CNN flatly: “This is like the guy who robbed your house proposing a working group on burglary.”

Trump’s advisers, including Secretary of State Rex Tillerson and Treasury Secretary Steve Mnuchin, had recently sought to explain Trump’s cyber push.

Mnuchin said on Saturday that Trump and Putin had agreed to create “a cyber unit to make sure that there was absolutely no interference whatsoever, that they would work on cyber security together.”

But Trump returned to Twitter this morning to play down the idea, which arose at his talks with Putin at a summit of the Group of 20 nations in Hamburg, Germany.

“The fact that President Putin and I discussed a Cyber Security unit doesn’t mean I think it can happen. It can’t,” Trump said on Twitter.

He then noted that an agreement with Russia for a ceasefire in Syria “can & did” happen.

Republican Senator John McCain of Arizona acknowledged Trump’s desire to move forward with Russia, but added: “There has to be a price to pay.”

“There has been no penalty,” McCain, who chairs the Senate Armed Services Committee, told CBS’ “Face the Nation” program according to a CBS transcript.

“Vladimir Putin ... got away with literally trying to change the outcome ... of our election.”

Trump argued for a rapprochement with Moscow in his campaign but has been unable to deliver because his administration has been dogged by investigations into the allegations of Russian interference in the election and ties with his campaign.

Special Counsel Robert Mueller is investigating the matter, including whether there may have been any collusion on the part of Trump campaign officials, as are congressional committees including both the House of Representatives and Senate intelligence panels.

Those probes are focused almost exclusively on Moscow’s actions, lawmakers and intelligence officials say, and no evidence has surfaced publicly implicating other countries despite Trump’s suggestion that others could have been involved.

Moscow has denied any interference, and Trump says his campaign did not collude with Russia.

Representative Adam Schiff, the top Democrat on the House Intelligence Committee, told CNN’s State of the Union programme that Russia could not be a credible partner in a cyber security unit.

“If that’s our best election defense, we might as well just mail our ballot boxes to Moscow,” Schiff added.

Separately, US government officials said a recent hack into business systems of US nuclear power and other energy companies was carried out by Russian government hackers, the Washington Post reported on Saturday.

Trump said he “strongly pressed President Putin twice about Russian meddling in our election. He vehemently denied it.”

He added: “We negotiated a ceasefire in parts of Syria which will save lives. Now it is time to move forward in working constructively with Russia!”

In Trump’s first attempt at ending the six-year Syrian civil war, the United States, Russia and Jordan on Friday reached a ceasefire and “de-escalation agreement” for southwestern Syria. The ceasefire was holding hours after it took effect yesterday, a monitor and two rebel officials said.

Any joint US-Russia cyber initiative would have been a different matter. Depending how much it veered into military or espionage operations, it could have faced major legal hurdles.

Language in the 2017 National Defense Authorization Act prohibits the Pentagon, which includes the National Security Agency and the US military’s Cyber Command, from using any funds for bilateral military cooperation with Russia.

Michael McFaul, a former US ambassador to Russia, also noted restrictions on sharing information with Russia that would clearly prohibit offering Moscow a sense of US cyber capabilities. Russia would be similarly adverse to revealing its capabilities to the United States, he noted.

“It just will not happen,” McFaul told Reuters. — Reuters</s>President Donald Trump suggested on Sunday that he will not pursue a joint cybersecurity task force with Russia, throwing cold water on speculation that sprung from comments he made on Twitter earlier in the day.

"The fact that President Putin and I discussed a Cyber Security unit doesn't mean I think it can happen. It can't-but a ceasefire can,& did!" Trump said in a tweet Sunday evening.

The tweet seemed to be an attempt to quell criticism of Trump's highly publicized meeting with Russian President Vladimir Putin.

After the meeting, conflicting reports emerged over how strongly Trump pressed Putin about Russian interference in the US election and whether Trump accepted Putin's denials of involvement. Trump then raised eyebrows by revealing on Twitter earlier Sunday that they had discussed forming an "impenetrable Cyber Security unit so that election hacking, & many other negative things, will be guarded and safe."

The admission alarmed some politicians, who said it seemed to show Trump trusted Putin's word over that of senior US intelligence officials. Republican Sen. Marco Rubio of Florida quipped that "partnering with Putin on a 'Cyber Security Unit' is akin to partnering with Assad on a 'Chemical Weapons Unit,'" referring to Syrian President Bashar al-Assad.

During their meeting, Trump and Putin also brokered an open-ended cease-fire in southern Syria, earning some praise. However, experts have said that the cease-fire is virtually unenforceable and that no cease-fire during the six-year-old Syrian war has lasted longer than six months.
U.S. President Donald Trump says he and Russian President Vladimir Putin "discussed forming an impenetrable cyber security unit so that election hacking, and many other negative things, will be guarded and safe." Trump later says he does not think this will happen.