At a Georgia rally on Aug. 3, Donald Trump congratulated Russian dictator Vladimir Putin for the historic prisoner exchange arranged by U.S. President Joe Biden that freed 16 people wrongfully imprisoned in Russia, including the Wall Street Journal reporter Evan Gershkovich.
"By the way, I’d like to congratulate Vladimir Putin for having made yet another great deal,” Trump said. “Did you see the deal we made? Now look, we want to get people in. We got 59 hostages — I never paid anything."
"They released some of the greatest killers anywhere in the world," Trump added. "Some of the most evil killers they got. And we got our people back, but boy, we made some horrible, horrible deals. And it’s nice to say we got them back, but does that set a bad precedent?"
The historic release included 16 prisoners freed from Russia, including five Germans and seven Russian citizens being held as political prisoners. President Joe Biden thanked Germany, Poland, Slovenia, Norway and Turkey for helping with the multi-country prisoner swap. Biden did not praise Putin in his remarks.
Turkey's National Intelligence Organization was a mediator in the Aug. 1 prisoner exchange involving 26 people from seven countries — U.S., Germany, Poland, Slovenia, Norway, Russia, and Belarus.
Martin Fornusek
(Updated: )
