President Biden has suffered another huge gaffe, mistakenly introducing Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky as “President Putin”.
It couldn’t be much worse, as Zelensky is still at war with Vladimir Putin – with a Ukrainian hospital bombed in a sickening attack earlier this week.
When speaking at a NATO press conference on Wednesday night in front of other world leaders, Biden awkwardly said: ” And now I want to hand it over to the President of Ukraine, who has as much courage as he has determination. Ladies and gentlemen, President Putin.”
The audience started clapping despite the big blunder, and Biden quickly realised his monumental error and returned to the podium to correct himself.
“President Putin? He’s going to beat President Putin. President Zelensky,” said Biden, 81, who then tried to explain why he made the mistake.
He added: “I’m so focussed on beating Putin.”
Zelensky then got a laugh in the room by replying: “I’m better.”
The timing couldn’t be much worse, with Biden facing calls to quit the presidential race from within his own party.
It comes aftyer a White House offical said he had hoped Biden would make a public gaffe – as it could be fatal to his campaign.
“This is a terrible thing to say,” an anonymous White House official told The Atlantic in a story published Wednesday. “But that might be the only thing that could force him out at this point, while there’s still time to rewrite the ending.”
Ukrainian President Zelensky has challenged former President Donald Trump on his stance in Ukraine by asking him to release a plan for ending the ongoing war with Russia.
“If Trump knows how to finish this war, he should tell us today,” Zelensky said in an hour-long interview with Bloomberg Television on Wednesday.
“Because if there are risks to Ukraine’s independence, if there are risks that we will lose the statehood, then we want to be ready for this,” he said. “We want to understand whether in November, we will have the most powerful support of the US or we’ll be all alone.”
Zelensky added that he was “potentially ready” to meet with Trump to hear his team’s proposal on ending the war in Ukraine.
