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In March 2023, Russian security forces detained Wall Street Journal reporter Evan Gershkovich and falsely accused the journalist of espionage. It was the first such arrest of American journalist in Russia since the latter days of the Cold War.
The move sparked bipartisan outrage, though Donald Trump, for reasons he did not explain, said literally nothing — for over a year. Given the former president’s apparent eagerness to curry favor with Vladimir Putin, the Republican’s silence did not go unnoticed.
In April, more than a year after Gershkovich was first detained, Trump sat down with Time magazine, which asked why the presumptive GOP nominee hasn’t called for the reporter’s release. “I guess because I have so many things I’m working on,” Trump replied.
In the same interview, however, the former president declared, in reference to Gershkovich, “I’ll get him released. He’ll be released. Putin is going to release him.”
Yesterday, at 1:30 a.m. eastern, Trump shed additional light on the subject with a curious message published to his social media platform.
“Evan Gershkovich, the Reporter from The Wall Street Journal, who is being held by Russia, will be released almost immediately after the Election, but definitely before I assume Office. He will be HOME, SAFE, AND WITH HIS FAMILY. Vladimir Putin, President of Russia, will do that for me, but not for anyone else, and WE WILL BE PAYING NOTHING!”
This sparked a considerable amount of speculation as to what in the world Trump was getting at. So far, he hasn’t elaborated, and the subject didn’t come up during the former president’s rally in New York.
But there are basically three possibilities here.
1. Trump was guessing at what Putin is thinking. Perhaps the Republican was merely speculating about future events, effectively guessing in a chest-thumping sort of way. If this interpretation is correct, Trump doesn’t know that Gershkovich will be released sometime between early November and mid-January, but the former president expects that based on his assumptions about Putin and the Russian leader’s eagerness to make him happy.
2. Trump has secret insights into what Putin is thinking. In both the Time magazine interview and his online message, Trump appeared to speak with great confidence about what, exactly, Putin would do in the coming months. Note the declarative sentences about future events: “Putin is going to release him,” and the Russian autocrat “will do that for me.” It raises the unsettling possibility that the presumptive Republican nominee has direct insights into Putin’s plans, and Trump is simply passing along his benefactor’s intentions.
3. Trump was sending a message to Putin. Maybe Trump wasn’t guessing, and perhaps he has no insights into Moscow’s plans, but it’s possible that the Republican was instead trying to let Putin know about his own preferences.
As New York magazine’s Jon Chait argued, “Perhaps he’s right that Putin ‘will do that for me, but not for anyone else.’ But that is because Putin rightly considers Trump an ally in whose success he is invested. What’s worse is that, by openly signaling to Putin that he does not want Gershkovich to be freed before the election, he is destroying whatever chances may exist to secure his release before then. If Gershkovich goes free prior to the election, Trump would look foolish, and Trump understands perfectly well Putin does not want that to happen.”
Hanging overhead is a question the former president probably won’t answer: If Trump has unique influence with Putin, and the Russian leader is prepared to release Gershkovich as a favor to the Republican, why doesn’t Trump use that power now and help bring the reporter home immediately?
The presumptive GOP nominee could claim credit, spend the next several months bragging about the feat, and bask in the pre-election praise. So why not pick up the phone and use his leverage now?