despite the fact that he hadn t changed any of his behavior, he hadn t even apologized for his behavior for his maligned behavior from syria to the shooting down of the mh-17 and the novichok poisonings. he didn t have to change any of that behavior. more than that, he got a pass for it. he got a pass for all of the activity from the united states president. that is absolutely extraordinary. i think it s something that even vladimir putin flying back to moscow this evening and all the oligarchs in russia and all the other politicians in that country will be celebrating and chuckling and, again, toasting president trump this evening. i want to also go to cnn s nic robertson for your perspective. nic, you talked about the last time the first time these two
world leaders met in hamburg, essentially the u.s. got played on syria and the safe zones that were anything but safe. they have now been under attack systematically. i m wondering what you make of how the u.s. fared in this meeting? reporter: anderson, look, i think you have utterly dissected it on point on message. the last time president trump was played on syria, he s been played on everything here. the idea as john was saying that russia could be some part of the investigation into its own malfeasance if they just sort of if the united states just hands over bill browder in advance of that is just ridiculous. the idea that russia could be the ben ferefactor for all thos syrians that along with assad it s been starving, starving, starving them out of these villages and towns. they haven t just been bombing them, they have been starving them out. that s why they have been forced
ordered not only interference in 2016 but continues to order such interference in the u.s. an around europe, for him to stand with him and say that he accepts his denials is both retroactively just indefensible but also today, because it s happening right now. and the concern is that russia will take it to another level in 2018 and 2020 by actually interfering in the voting process. the other thing i would say is this, anderson. the president raised something that you ve heard on some far right websites over the last few months that, well, the assessment that russia did this is wrong because the dnc never turned over their server, et cetera. it s utter misdirection. so anyone who pursues this either is ignoring the intelligence or doesn t know the intelligence. for the u.s. intelligence community to make this assessment with confidence, they have a whole host of factors that go into it. certainly electronic evidence that traces the actors who stole this information and distributed it.
russia investigation. but i will tell you, it was astonishing, just astonishing to be in the room with the u.s. president and with the russian president on this critical question of election interference and to hear the president of the united states retreat back to these talking points about dnc servers and hillary clinton s e-mails when he had a chance right there in front of us, right there in front of the world to confront vladimir putin and tell him to stay the hell out of american democracy, and he just didn t do it. it was one of those moments, i think, obviously we all think this is a very big deal right now and sometimes these sorts of things can fade away. but i don t think this is one of those moments. this is one of those moments, anderson, i think really crystallizes a very critical problem for the united states right now in that you have the president, the leader of the free world, taking the word of vladimir putin who from all accounts inside the u.s. government, the u.s
donald trump in the 80s took out big, big ads in the new york times criticizing president reagan s foreign policy towards russia, calling it spineless. calling reagan spineless as reagan was with gorbachev winning the cold war. you could say reagan was winning the cold war an donald trump took out this ad. there s something strange about the inner makeup that he has very thin skin. he s obviously feeling a little bit maybe strange about the election. it s hard to get into his head. but in the end you have to start trying to get into the head because the facts don t make any sense whatsoever. jim sciutto, i know you have more diplomatic reaction. this is from a senior ukrainian diplomat who sent the following. i asked for his reaction to the president not calling out the russian president for its invasion of eastern ukraine and annexation of crimea and just listen to these words.