Russia on Monday confirmed President Vladimir Putin has gifted Donald Trump a portrait he commissioned of the US leader.
Putin gave the painting to Steve Witkoff, Trump’s special Middle East and Ukraine envoy , in Moscow earlier this month, Kremlin spokesperson, Dmitry Peskov, said in a response to a journalist’s question, declining further comment.
The gift was first mentioned last week by Witkoff in an interview with former Fox News host Tucker Carlson. Witkoff told Carlson the picture was “beautiful” and Trump “was clearly touched” by his Russian counterpart’s gesture.
During his interview with Carlson, Witkoff described the Russian leader’s gift as “gracious.” Witkoff also recalled being told by Putin that he (Putin) prayed for Trump when the-then US presidential candidate narrowly survived an assassination attempt in July last year.
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“He was praying for his friend,” Witkoff said, recounting Putin’s comments.
Witkoff’s meeting with Putin took place after talks with Russian officials about trying to end the war in Ukraine. Ceasefire talks continued Monday in Saudi Arabia, where American officials met their Russian counterparts, a day after meeting with Ukrainian negotiators.
It was not immediately known if the portrait has been examined for bugs. The White House hasn’t commented on the portrait.
In 2018, Putin gave Trump, then in his first term, a soccer ball, which the Secret Service checked for “listening devices before Trump gave it to his son. The precaution went back an incident in 1945, when a carving of the Great Seal of the United States was given as a gift from Soviet school children to then-US ambassador Averell Harriman.
The present had turned out to be bugged. The gift hung in Harriman’s office for six years, allowing the Soviet Union to eavesdrop on his conversations until the US State Department discovered it contained a covert listening device.
Putin’s gifts for previous US Presidents
Trump isn’t the first incumbent US president to receive a gift from Putin. In 2021, Putin gave Joe Biden a $12,000 lacquer writing box and pen during a summit in Geneva, Switzerland. In 2013, he reportedly sent Barack Obama porcelain plates and espresso cups.
This apparently isn’t the first portrait of a US leader Putin has sent, either. In 2014, he reportedly sent to George HW Bush a portrait of the former American president on the latter’s 90th birthday.
