Anchorage, Alaska — The Trump administration is facing fresh scrutiny after sensitive U.S. government documents detailing President Donald Trump’s private summit with Russian President Vladimir Putin were discovered in a hotel business center in Anchorage.
The papers, marked with U.S. State Department insignia, were left in a public printer at Hotel Captain Cook — a four-star property just 20 minutes from Joint Base Elmendorf-Richardson, where Trump and Putin met on August 15. Three hotel guests stumbled upon the eight-page packet Friday morning, photographing the contents before alerting NPR.
The documents contained precise information about the summit’s schedule, locations inside the military base, and direct phone numbers for U.S. government employees. They even revealed personal touches Trump planned for Putin, including a ceremonial gift: an American Bald Eagle Desk Statue.
Names, numbers, and phonetics
Pages 2 through 5 identified 13 U.S. and Russian officials expected at the meetings, alongside the names and contact details of three American staff members. To avoid diplomatic embarrassment, the documents included phonetic pronunciations for Russian dignitaries, spelling Putin’s name as “POO-tihn.”
A canceled lunch — and a menu for Putin
The final pages laid out a three-course luncheon “in honor of his excellency Vladimir Putin,” with Trump seated directly across from his Russian counterpart. The seating chart showed Trump flanked by Secretary of State Marco Rubio, Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth, and other senior aides, while Putin would sit alongside Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov.
Although the lunch was reportedly cancelled at the last minute, the documents show what had been planned: green salad, filet mignon, halibut olympia, and crème brûlée for dessert.
Experts slam “sloppiness”
National security experts immediately condemned the episode as a glaring breach.
“You just don’t leave things in printers. It’s that simple,” said Jon Michaels, a UCLA law professor who lectures on national security. “This is further evidence of the sloppiness and incompetence of the administration.”
The White House and State Department have not commented.
A pattern of breaches
This isn’t the first time Trump officials have mishandled sensitive material. Earlier this week, members of a federal law enforcement group chat mistakenly added a stranger to a conversation about an ongoing manhunt. In March, national security officials accidentally included a journalist in a group chat about impending strikes in Yemen.
For critics, the Alaskan incident underscores a dangerous pattern of carelessness at the highest levels of government — one made more alarming by the geopolitical stakes of Trump’s direct engagement with Putin.