The best part of President Donald Trump’s presidency? The way it makes the media go crazy. This time the media has gone insane because Secretary of State Rex Tillerson dropped his press pool for an unscheduled meeting with Russian President Vladimir Putin on his trip to Moscow.
Can you blame him, though? After all, the media treat members of this administration fairly and without any bias. *cough*Jeff Sessions*cough*
We all knew Tillerson scheduled a trip to Moscow for this week, but plans stated that he would just meet with Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov. On Monday, Reuters reiterated that Tillerson and Putin would not meet:
But Putin’s spokesman, Dmitry Peskov, told reporters on Monday that no such meeting was planned, suggesting Tillerson will follow strict diplomatic protocol and only meet his direct counterpart, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov.”We have not announced any such meetings and right now there is no meeting with Tillerson in the president’s diary,” Peskov told reporters on a conference call.He did not say why Putin was not planning to receive Tillerson.
This came as a surprise to many since former Secretary of State John Kerry met with Putin when he had meetings with Lavrov in Moscow. Plus, Putin and Tillerson have a past due to numerous deals with ExxonMobil.
I think it also shocked the media because they are determined that Trump and Putin are secret best friends.
However, tensions have risen between the U.S. and Russia since Trump ordered an airstrike on Syria for the chemical attack allegedly ordered by President Bashar al-Assad. Putin has remained the dictator’s strongest ally. From USA Today:
“It can be said that the level of trust at the working level, especially at the military level, has not become better but most likely has degraded,” he told state broadcaster Mir TV.Putin also charged that the U.S. broke international law by striking the air base without providing evidence that the Syrian government used chemical weapons.
Okay, bro. I could go on about international laws you’ve broken (Crimea), but I won’t.
Like I said, the best part is watching the media whine and moan on social media.
Tillerson and Lavrov held a joint press conference once all the meetings ended. Of course the media immediately asked Tillerson about his meeting with Putin and he acknowledged that “the current state of U.S.-Russia relations is at a low point.” From The Washington Examiner:
“I had about two hours with President Putin,” Tillerson said in a news conference with Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov. “We frankly discussed the current state of U.S.-Russia relations.””I expressed the view that the current state of U.S.-Russia relations is at a low point,” Tillerson said. “There is a low level of trust between our two countries. The world’s two foremost nuclear powers cannot have this kind of relationship.””We further discussed approaches to improving our channels of communication,” Tillerson said. “We had a lengthy exchange of views regarding the situation in Syria and shared perspectives on possible ways forward.”
Another reporter asked Tillerson about possible Russian interference in our 2016 presidential election:
Tillerson responded, saying: “We touched on it briefly, on the issue of cyber security and, in particular, on the challenges that it is placing on everyone, in terms of a new threat, an emerging threat.””But I do make a distinction when cyber tools are used to interfere with the internal decisions among countries as to how their elections are conducted. That is one use of cyber tools. Cyber tools to disrupt weapons programs, that’s another use of the tools. And I make a distinction between those two.”Added Tillerson: “Clearly this is an issue that has emerged in our time for which we have yet, as an international community, come to some conclusion on how we want to respond to that. So there will be further discussions. And it is on the agenda. And it is in the agenda that Foreign Minister Lavrov has to meet for us to have further discussions in the future.”
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