OUTFRONT tonight,
Putin's assassin demand.
We are learning tonight
that Putin refused to release
American Paul
Whelan along with Brittney Griner
unless Viktor Boot was returned.
In addition
to a convicted assassin
and former Russian spy.
This news coming as we're
hearing new details
about Griner's nearly
ten months in prison tonight.
She landed in Texas today.
And tonight, we're learning her
forced labor consisted
of helping make uniforms
along with other key
details of her imprisonment.
But we still don't know tonight
what condition
Paul Wieland is in because Putin
is refusing to release him
unless he gets this assassin back.
You're looking at him.
His name is Vadim Crash, a cop,
and he's currently
serving a life sentence in Germany
for killing someone
three years
ago, execution style in broad daylight
in a park
classic of executed his target
using a silencer,
approaching him from behind,
shooting him twice in the body
and then shooting him
in the back of the head
as he lay on the ground.
It was a hit
the German court found was ordered
by the Russian government itself.
Now, I'm going to be speaking with Paul
Wieland sister in a few moments
because as Wieland is still suffering
in a Russian penal colony tonight,
there are celebrations in Russia.
Celebrations for Viktor Boot's
triumphant return
boot freed from American prison
where he was serving.
25 years for his work
as the most prolific arms
dealer in history
and for plotting to kill Americans.
Russian newspapers
displaying a big smiling picture
of boot across the front pages
The headline on this paper, for example,
Reading Boot is Happy
How the Russian businessman,
that's what they call
him, managed
to return from prison in the US.
Now, Boot also went on Russia today.
It's a Russian state media program
and he did it right away.
And he took this swipe
at the United States,
making it clear he is now focused
on Ukraine.
You touched on know
the West
believes that they did
not finish us off in 1990
when the Soviet Union began to collapse.
This is a point that Putin himself
makes repeatedly.
The point is that the West is now
using Ukraine
as a way to destroy Russia itself.
But and Putin
seemed to share a worldview and boot
now owes Putin
his freedom
and Putin may be ready to ask
for payback.
And here's
what the woman who was credited
by the secretary general of the U.N.
for boots
arrest told me yesterday
that payback could be
Putin is going to be ready to deploy
Viktor Bout.
He comes with years of experience,
years of contacts.
He started in Ukraine.
And I think
that's one of the areas
we have to be concerned about right away.
Victor Boot will be a major asset
for Putin,
a major asset for Putin.
And a major asset
is what Putin desperately
needs right now.
Let me play for you
this surprising and notable exchange
today between a reporter and Putin.
And I say surprising
because what you're going to hear here
is that the reporter references
the daily news of social media posts
and leaked phone conversations
we've been playing for you
where Russian soldiers
slam their equipment,
their training and their commanders
by saying even
what you were speaking out
was no Iranian army.
Recently,
there have been conflicting reports
about the supply of the army.
You said that
the problems are being solved
or they have already been solved.
But nevertheless, the flow of messages
from the fighters from the front lines
does not stop.
Appeals go to the military, commissaries
to volunteers.
They ask
not only for uniforms,
but also for medicine,
because consumables run out very quickly
and the question is,
who do believe
Department of Defense reports or
the frontline soldiers
you can with?
You can't trust anyone.
Only I can be trusted.
Don't trust the soldiers
on the front lines.
Don't trust the military.
Only I can be trusted.
He says it with a smirk.
The words of a dictator
who sees only one path
out of Ukraine victory.
In fact, tonight,
Putin said he's
considering formally altering
the military doctrine of Russia
to allow for Russia to strike first
to launch a preemptive nuclear strike
against a foreign power.
Kaylee Atwood
begins our coverage OUTFRONT
tonight in Washington and Kylie,
Putin tonight
saying the door is open
for another prisoner exchange.
Perhaps referencing that assassin
we're talking about saying they want
classic off back.
What is the likelihood this happens?
Well, listen, we know that U.S.
officials have already received
that request from Russians
a number of times,
and they have simply said
it's not something they can deliver on.
It's not something
that Germany is willing to do.
But the last few months
are going to greatly inform
what the following months,
the months to come look like,
because U.S.
officials know
the types of things
that they could offer Russia
that they're not going to accept
some of the names that we know that U.S.
officials floated in an effort
to get home.
Paul Whalen
with Brittney
Griner include Alexander Vinicky,
as a Russian
who is expatriated to the United States
just in August.
And he is facing charges of money
laundering and extortion
just among a few.
And then there is another Russian
Alex excuse me, Roman Salles knows.
He is someone who has been involved
in cyber criminals.
He's facing
a 14 year prison
sentence, serving that
in the United States right now.
That's not to say that those names
won't come up again,
but they're not going to be posed
to the Russians
in the same form
that they have in the past.
I spoke with
a senior administration official
who explained
that the Biden ministration
realizes that they need to put forward
some new ideas here, and that's
what they're thinking about right now.
They're trying to figure out
a way
forward, trying to figure out something
that Russia will accept now,
as you noted, out of the gates
there, Aaron.
President Putin did say today
that it is possible
there could be another prisoner swap
on the face of it.
That sounds great.
But we heard
just in recent hours
from the deputy national security
adviser,
John Finer,
who expressed some caution,
saying
you can't take
everything that President Putin says
for face value,
but the US is committed
to trying to get Paul Whalen home.
Certainly, certainly true
without that comment.
All right.
Thank you so much, Kylie Atwood,
with all those details from Washington.
I want to go now to Paul Wieland
sister, Elizabeth.
And Elizabeth
I'm glad to speak to you again.
You know, obviously, I would have hoped
it would have been
in different circumstances
with with celebration for your family.
But you are still waiting tonight.
Do you
when you hear these details that that
that Putin
may may do
another exchange
that he desperately
wants the democratic of that
he had tried to to to engineer that swap?
Possibly.
Do you think that makes sense?
Should classic art
be handed over
in exchange for your brother
You know, it's very interesting.
Ever since
his release yesterday,
members of Congress
and pundits in the media
have been weighing in with hot takes.
About.
About boot, about Britney, about.
About this guy, this assassin.
And about.
About my brother.
And it's been very difficult
for my family
to hear my brother discussed as if
his only value was
what we would have to give up for him.
That's you know,
look, it's a poignant thing to say.
I guess on a certain level, from a policy
perspective, it
it does boil down to that.
I mean, has
your family had any conversations with
with the government
about this,
about what
they are willing to do to bring him home?
I think we've made it pretty clear
that as far as I'm concerned,
at least
my brother is worth
more, has a greater value
than any Russian criminal.
So are they responsive to that?
Do they
do they understand
where you're coming from?
Do they do
they internalize it in a meaningful way?
Well, I have tried
not to discuss Putin's gift registry,
but so much I'm not going to carry
the water
for the Russians
if they've got an argument to make
about something that they want.
They need to make it
through the diplomatic channels.
And I expect that now
BG is back, that
the teams that have been working to help
get Paul home
over the last months and years
are going to hit the ground running,
trying to figure out a new way
to solve this problem.
And do you think that the US
learned anything when you talk about big,
of course, Brittney Griner?
Has the US learned anything from
what's happened
here, from the fact
that they were able
to secure her release,
you know, in exchange
for a notorious arms dealer,
Viktor Bout
anything that could help with
securing Paul's release?
I certainly
hope so,
because
Paul has been waiting
for a very long time
You know,
he sat through
the previous administration
and now this one
watching other people go home.
I can't imagine what his life is
like day to day
in the prison
the resolve that he is showing.
But how long will that resolve last?
And I'm hoping that people
are feeling a greater sense of urgency
to solve this problem. And get him home.
Elizabeth, I'm curious
whether in your conversations
with the U.S.
government,
have they ever talk to you
about why
they think it has been harder
to secure his release?
You know why?
Others, you point out
he's been there so much longer
than so many others. Right.
And that and others come and others
go and swaps happen. And yet not him.
Yeah.
I mean,
really, from
the start, the FSB set Paul up.
They gave him a USB drive
and then arrested him 5 minutes later.
Saying that the USB drive contains
state secrets.
And from that point on,
they held him for 18 months
before TiVo prison in pretrial detention,
then had a sham trial
and sent him
sentenced him
to six years for this, quote,
unquote, espionage.
And so ever since then, they have
this is a Russian fairy tale,
and they have decided that
because of this, quote unquote value
Paul has, that
they should be able to ask
for something big in return.
And do you have any more or less hope
tonight, Elizabeth,
after the Greiner swap
that Paul will be home soon?
And I use that word soon.
I know it's
undefinable, but
do you have more
hope or less hope tonight?
It really hasn't changed
to a certain extent
because Trevor and Paul,
Trevor and Britney's
situations were treated differently.
That still left the situation with Paul.
And how is that going to get resolved?
I do know that I will be bearing down
much more with much more pressure
on the people I've been working with
because I don't want to
see this happen again.