WASHINGTON (AP) — President Donald Trump is again contending that his Helsinki summit with Russia's president was a "great success" and blaming what he calls "the Fake News Media" for contrary views.

The president backed off his earlier remarks undermining U.S. intelligence agencies, saying Tuesday he had simply misspoken a day earlier when he said he saw no reason to believe Russia had interfered in the 2016 U.S. election.

Trump sought to end 27 hours of bipartisan recrimination by delivering a rare admission of error. But that didn't explain why Trump waited so long to correct his remarks. And the scripted cleanup pertained only to the least defensible of his comments.

The president had tweeted a half-dozen times and sat for two television interviews since the Putin news conference before citing the error.