Dan Rather: Trump and Putin’s Behavior Is ‘Deeply Strange and Dangerous’

Appearing Friday on CNN with host Anderson Cooper, former CBS Evening News anchor Dan Rather criticized President Donald Trump’s performance at the G-20 summit in Osaka, Japan, claiming Trump and Russian president Vladimir Putin’s actions were “deeply strange and dangerous.”

“History is watching through all this,” @DanRather says after President Trump praised Saudi Crown Prince bin Salman after cozying up to Putin and saying he’d meet Kim Jong Un.

“The President is praising almost any autocrat he can find.” https://t.co/jEcW69fVBd pic.twitter.com/xdRpFgzSnt

— Anderson Cooper 360° (@AC360) June 29, 2019

A partial transcript is as follows: 

ANDERSON COOPER: I still do not get used to President Trump genuflecting in front of dictators around the world.

DAN RATHER: This is deeply strange, at least borderline bizarre, to see what happened today in that meeting with Putin. But as you just outlined, that was only the beginning. He praises the leader of Saudi Arabia. To put this in context, we have to understand, and whether you’re Republican, Democrat, Independent or whatever, that under President Trump, American foreign policy has become incoherent and immaturish. For example, tweeting to the president of North Korea, “Meet me at the DMZ, just to see you and say hello,” Those kinds of things.

COOPER: I thought that was actually a joke when somebody said there’s now this tweet saying “Oh, you know, I’ll swing by the border just to saw hello.”

RATHER:  It turns out it wasn’t a joke. We knew it came directly from the president. The point is history is watching through all this. And let’s just start but we won’t end with whatever’s going on with President Trump and President Putin. As I say, deeply strange and dangerous. History’s watching, but they’re also watching all of this business with America foreign policies being incoherent all over the lot. The president himself doesn’t seem all that interested in learning about foreign policy, which can be complicated. He no longer reads the intelligence report… It’s hard to say in President Trump’s case whether it’s more ineptitude, ignorance or mendacity. But whatever it is, it’s dangerous for the country. And there is this, at the same time the president is almost praising ay autocrat he can find.