WASHINGTON – President Donald Trump said Friday his administration did not pay a $2 million medical bill demanded by North Korean leader Kim Jong Un for the release of hostage Otto Warmbier.

"No money was paid to North Korea for Otto Warmbier, not two Million Dollars, not anything else," Trump tweeted.

The president made the claim the day after The Washington Post reported

North Korea sent a $2 million bill for Warmbier's medical treatment after it released him from prison in 2017. Warmbier was released to the U.S. in a coma from a massive brain injury.

Warmbier, 21, died shortly after being returned to his family in Ohio.

The Washington Post reported Thursday that North Korea presented a U.S. envoy with a $2 million bill for Warmbier's hospital care, a brazen request from a regime that sentenced the college student to hard labor for removing a poster from a hotel.

More:Report: North Korea billed US $2 million for Otto Warmbier's medical care

More:'I don't believe he knew about it.' Trump defends Kim Jong Un on Otto Warmbier's death

"The main U.S. envoy sent to retrieve Warmbier signed an agreement to pay the medical bill on instructions passed down from President Trump, according to two people familiar with the situation," the Post reported, though there is no evidence the bill was ever paid.

Trump's critics accused him of paying ransom for release of a hostage, something for which he had criticized the Barack Obama administration. Trump denied it in his tweet (and again criticized Obama).

Back in February, some U.S. lawmakers criticized Trump for saying he did not hold Kim responsible for the death of Warmbier.

"I don't believe he knew about it," Trump said after holding a summit meeting with the North Korean leader in Vietnam. "He tells me that he didn't know about it and I will take him at his word."

The nuclear summit in Hanoi collapsed when two leaders could not agree on a plan to have North Korea eliminate its nuclear weapons programs in exchange for relief from economic sanctions.

Throughout nuclear talks with the North Koreans, Trump has largely avoided discussing Kim's human rights record.