GOP to White House: End summit mystery

Lawmakers on both sides of the aisle are worried that Russian President Vladimir Putin may use his one-on-one meeting with President Trump in Helsinki to drive a wedge between NATO allies by claiming secret side deals with the United States.

Congressional Republicans are urging the White House to get ahead of the Kremlin by defining what was and wasn't agreed to. What was said between the two leaders, they admit, remains a disconcerting mystery.

Senate Foreign Relations Committee Chairman Bob Corker (R-Tenn.) says he has "no idea" what Russian ambassador to the United States Anatoly Antonov meant when he said Wednesday that Trump and Putin had entered into "important verbal agreements."

Corker expressed concern about talk that the White House and Kremlin are "setting up a second meeting so they can begin implementation" of these mystery agreements.

Other Republicans pointed to the lack of transparency as problematic.

"I don't know what happened privately, nobody does," said Sen. Rob Portman (Ohio), adding that Trump needs to publicize whatever efforts he made to push back against Putin in their private meeting.

"It's not enough just to raise it privately because everyone is watching, including our allies, including the people of Russia, including our intelligence agencies," he said of any grievances Trump may have aired with Putin.

Antonov said this week that Trump and Putin reached verbal agreements on two charged issues: Syria and arms control.

"The White House better get out in front of this before the Russians start characterizing this," warned Sen. Jeff Flake (R-Ariz.), a member of the Foreign Relations Committee and frequent Trump critic. "The Russians will use this."

"There's so little trust of this president, our president, among our allies," he added

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