U.S. President Donald Trump and Russia's President Vladimir Putin attend a joint press conference after a meeting at the Presidential Palace in Helsinki, on July 16, 2018. (Xinhua/AFP PHOTO)

WASHINGTON, July 17 (Xinhua) -- The Trump administration was reportedly adopting steps to clean up the "mess" of the Helsinki meeting on Tuesday, one day after the first one-on-one gathering between U.S. President Donald Trump and his Russian counterpart Vladimir Putin.

Senior administration officials told CBS News that a "damage control" effort is underway to clean up the mess created by Trump's comments in Helsinki. Officials reportedly wanted Trump to say clearly that he believes U.S. intelligence over Putin and that there will not be any effort by the U.S. to cooperate with Russia on the ongoing probe of Russia's alleged meddling of U.S. elections.

The report came when the United States was flooded with slams against Trump's reconciliatory remarks that many in the country have seen as a signal to publicly side with Putin in attacking U.S. intelligence community.

For his part, Trump on Tuesday thanked Senator Rand Paul over his supportive remarks. The Republican lawmaker has made himself quite singular in Congress by saying that "if there wasn't such acute hatred for President Trump, such a 'Trump derangement syndrome' on the left...," a meeting with a Russian leader could have happened sooner.

He also noted that the current blowback from the meeting "really shows people hatred for President Trump."

The trump administration's statement has so far failed to shut the voices of both parties that had been angered over Trump's unilateralism-laden foreign policies since inauguration.

Senate Foreign Relations Committee Chairman Bob Corker told reporters that "I did not think this was a good moment for our country" and that "the president's comments made us look as a nation more like a pushover."

Of Putin, Corker said "I would guess he's having caviar right now."

Nicholas Burns, under secretary of state for political affairs from 2005 to 2008, went even further by calling Trump's Helsinki meeting "an absolute dereliction of duty."

"Trump did not say a single word of criticism & he had several opportunities to do so," he said in a flurry of tweet posts. "For Pres Trump to show so much respect to Putin & not to indicate any degree of criticism, frankly, it was weakness."

Trump's just-concluded tour to Europe has been "the most damaging trip by an American President in memory," he added. "Trump's disavowal of our intelligence community was the single most destructive and disloyal act of a modern President. His wrecking ball tour of Europe the single most damaging to NATO and the West."

Former U.S. Defense Secretary Ash Carter was also quoted by U.S. media as saying that "I never saw or imagined so uneven a handover of American security interests and principles with nothing in return...It was like watching the destruction of a cathedral."

Jan Eliasson, ex UN deputy secretary-general and Swedish foreign minister, also tweeted that "the past week was a geopolitical earthquake" as Trump attacked allies in European Union and NATO, sided with "foes," and gave Putin "higher credibility than his own intelligence services."

The cracks even emerged within the administration. Soon after the meeting when Trump seemed ready to take Putin's word over Russia's alleged election meddling, U.S. Director of National Intelligence Dan Coats went out quickly to counter him.

In a statement, Coats said that the U.S. intelligence community has "been clear in our assessments of Russian meddling in the 2016 election and their ongoing, pervasive efforts to undermine our democracy, and we will continue to provide unvarnished and objective intelligence in support of our national security."

However, in the eyes of BuzzFeed News, despite the lacking of substansive policy deliverables out of the meeting, "(Putin) took advantage of the short meeting and likely lack of deliverables to present a forceful image of himself as a man in charge."

"The Russian president didn't need concrete deliverables to come out of the meeting looking like a success," said the news outlet.

Yet Trump appeared to take a total different view as for the deliverables of his European trip. The U.S. President tweeted on Tuesday that "while I had a great meeting with NATO, raising vast amounts of money, I had an even better meeting with Vladimir Putin of Russia. Sadly, it is not being reported that way - the Fake News is going Crazy!"