quote:

Regarding foreign policy, NBC played a hitherto unheard tape of Trump discussing his relationships with autocratic and repressive world leaders.

“I get on very well with Erdoğan,” Trump said, referring to the president of Turkey. “Everyone says ‘what a horrible guy’ but for me it works out. It’s funny, the relationships I have, the tougher and meaner they are, the better I get along with them. Explain that to me someday, OK, but maybe it’s not a bad thing.

“The easy ones are maybe the ones I don’t like as much or don’t get along with as much.”

Woodward said “the president just controls foreign relations unilaterally. And he has decided, ‘Oh, I’m gonna get along with Putin, I’m gonna get along with the Crown Prince of Saudi Arabia, MBS. I’m gonna try to get along with Kim Jong-un, the leader of North Korea, but not South Korea and he just smears South Korea, time and time again in my interviews.”

Mohammad bin Salman, the Saudi crown prince, is believed to have ordered the killing and dismemberment of Jamal Khashoggi, a contributor to Woodward’s paper, the Washington Post.

In Rage, Woodward reports that Trump said he was “happy” that MBS has denied complicity in the murder and also said of the prince: “I saved his ass.”

“He is the face of the United States to the world,” Woodward told NBC. “And he has said, ‘Hey look, I get along with these bad guys, but not the good guys.”