President Trump threatened Russian President Vladimir Putin on Monday with a “very tough” U.S. response if evidence emerges to suggest Russia played a role in an alleged chemical weapons attack on Syrian civilians over the weekend.
“He may, yeah, he may. And if he does, it’s going to be very tough, very tough,” Trump told reporters at the White House when asked if Putin should pay a price for the attack, which reportedly left dozens dead.
“Everybody’s going to pay a price. He will, everybody will,” Trump added.
Following news of the chemical attack, Trump called Syrian President Bashar Assad an “animal” and called on his regime to open up the area so medical relief and investigators could access the site of the strike. Trump also lashed out at Russia and Iran for backing Assad despite evidence that the Syrian leader has deployed chemical weapons against his people on multiple occasions.
Trump described the attack as “atrocious” on Monday and vowed to respond within the next two days. In April 2017, the Trump administration authorized a missile strike on an air base controlled by Syrian military forces in response to another chemical attack.
