CNN anchor Anderson Cooper savaged President Trump on Monday, calling Trump’s appearance alongside Russian President Vladimir Putin at a joint press conference following their first official bilateral meetings “disgraceful.”
“You have been watching perhaps one of the most disgraceful performances by an American president at a summit in front of a Russian leader certainly that I’ve ever seen,” Cooper said as the network cut from footage of the media availability to a panel for analysis.
Trump and Putin faced reporters after the pair met one-on-one for two hours with only interpreters before expanding the discussions to include other officials and aides.
During the press conference, Putin denied Russian interference in the 2016 U.S. election, despite special counsel Robert Mueller on Friday indicting a dozen Kremlin-linked officials with hacking Democratic emails.
Trump, in response to a question regarding whether he believed Russia meddled in the election that catapulted him into the White House, said he didn’t “see any reason why” agents of Putin’s government would.
Trump added that Mueller’s federal Russia investigation was a “disaster” for the U.S. and its relationship with Russia, reiterating that he ran a “clean campaign” and there had been “no collusion.”
[Also read: Nancy Pelosi: Trump was ‘afraid’ to mention Russian indictments to Putin]
