NEWS
Biden stumbles over Zelenskyy introduction, calls Ukrainian leader ‘President Putin’
In his latest embarrassing Gaffe, President Biden on Thursday introduced Ukraine President Volodymyr Zelenskyy at the NATO conference in Washington, D.C., as “President Putin.”
“And now I want to hand it over to the president of Ukraine, who has as much courage as he has determination,” Biden said, before starting to leave the podium. “Ladies and gentlemen, President Putin.”
Biden seemed to realize his embarrassing verbal stumble mentioning Russian President Vladimir Putin, and attempted to quickly correct himself.
“He’s going to beat President Putin. President Zelenskyy I’m so focused on beating Putin,” he said. “We got to worry about it. Anyway, Mr. President.” Zelenskyy then appeared on stage and shook Biden’s hand and said, “I’m better.”
“You are a hell of a lot better,” Biden said. On Feb. 24, 2022, the world watched as Russia invaded Ukraine prompting an escalation to conflict in the region that has caused hundreds of thousands of military casualties and tens of thousands of Ukrainian civilian casualties.
Following his introduction of Zelenskyy, Biden was scheduled to conduct a “big boy” solo news conference sans teleprompters.
The news conference was highly anticipated, with lawmakers saying that Biden’s presser would serve as an “ultimate test” following his disastrous debate two weeks ago with former President Trump.