Nooooooooooo:

In Helsinki, @POTUS agreed to ongoing working level dialogue between the two security council staffs. President Trump asked @Ambjohnbolton to invite President Putin to Washington in the fall and those discussions are already underway.

— Sarah Sanders (@PressSec) July 19, 2018

There is, however, some “good” or at least non-bad news on the Trump/Putin front, which is that Trump has decided to decline Putin’s request to let Russian prosecutors question a number of former American officials who have been connections to a high-profile advocate of economic sanctions against Russia named Bill Browder. Of course, Putin will likely talk Trump into an idea even worse than that one if he does in fact come to the White House, and then we can do this whole week over again, only in a more autumnal setting, and perhaps with football season to distract us. (Just kidding, football will be ruined too.)

Here is director of national intelligence Dan Coats, who on Monday had to release a statement reaffirming that Russia hacked the Democratic Party in 2016 after Trump called Putin’s denial of responsibility “extremely strong and powerful,” reacting in real time to news of the potential summit:

Director of National Intelligence Dan Coats informed on stage at Aspen Security Forum that the Trump administration has invited Vladimir Putin to the White House.

"Say that again," he responds. https://t.co/RBdhdILVas pic.twitter.com/TZal1Xb4Yi

— ABC News (@ABC) July 19, 2018

As one of my colleagues put it after watching this, “Dan Coats wants to put his head through a wall.”

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