Biden mistakenly calls Zelenskiy ‘President Putin’ at Nato summit ahead of high-stakes press conference – live | Joe Biden

Dan Sabbagh

German chancellor Olaf Scholz was asked, in English, about Joe Biden’s gaffe in a press conference a few minutes later.

Scholz sidestepped the question, and said he hoped that Biden would continue to strongly support Ukraine.

Joe Biden and Volodymyr Zelenskiy held a bilateral meeting earlier today amid the Nato summit in Washington, during with the US president announced a new $225m aid package for Ukraine.

Ahead of the meeting, Biden told Zelenskiy:

We will stay with you, period.

The new US security package includes a Patriot missile system to bolster Ukraine’s air defences against a deadly onslaught of Russian airstrikes, as well as Stinger anti-aircraft missiles, ammunition for High Mobility Artillery Rocket Systems (HIMARS), and more artillery rounds.

Zelenskiy called the announcement “strong news” but emphasised that Kyiv also needed US permission to fire the long-range missiles it has provided at targets deeper inside Russian territory.

Biden mistakenly calls Zelenskiy ‘Putin’

Andrew Roth

Joe Biden accidentally introduced Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelenskiy as “President Putin” in a gaffe that will fuel further concerns about his mental acuity that have threatened to scuttle his presidential campaign.

Biden made the mistake during a signing ceremony alongside Zelenskiy on the final day of the Nato summit in Washington DC. It came just an hour before a rare press conference by Biden that has been called “make-or-break” for his campaign, as a growing number of political allies and donors have been calling for him to drop out of the race.

Concluding his opening remarks, Biden handed over to Zelenskyy with the words:

Now I want to hand it over to the president of Ukraine, who has as much courage as he has determination.

Biden said:

Ladies and gentlemen, President Putin!

Realising his mistake, Biden caught himself and said:

President Putin! We’re going to beat President Putin. President Zelenskiy. I’m so focused on beating Putin. We’ve got to worry about it. Anyway, Mr. President.

“I’m better,” Zelenskiy said, shaking Biden’s hand.

“You are a hell of a lot better,” Biden concluded his remarks.

The remark elicited gasps in the hall, where the two men were flanked by dozens of advisers, and in the press centre, where hundreds of journalists were watching the remarks live on an internal television feed.

Of course this isn’t the first time Joe Biden has mixed up the names of leaders. The US president has a long history of verbal gaffes.

In February during a Las Vegas rally, Biden mixed up the names of the French leaders, Emmanuel Macron, with François Mitterrand. Later that same week, Biden mixed up the former German chancellors Helmut Kohl with Angela Merkel.

“I am a gaffe machine,” Biden admitted in December 2018 when asked about potential liabilities of his election campaign. Here’s a list of previous gaffes that Biden has made.

Joe Biden, speaking to reporters at the Nato summit just now, mistakenly referred to Ukraine’s president, Volodymyr Zelenskiy, as “President Putin”.

Biden quickly realised his mistake and corrected himself. Zelenskiy joked:

I’m better.

Earlier today, the UK prime minister, Keir Starmer, was asked about his meeting with Joe Biden at the White House.

Biden was “on good form” and went through serious issues at pace during their first bilateral talks, Starmer answered.

The British prime minister said his personal view, having spent almost an hour in private talks with Biden and attended a dinner for Nato leaders at the White House, was that the US president was mentally agile.

Asked in a round of broadcast interviews whether criticism of Biden was misguided, the prime minister said:

Yes … my own personal view is he was on good form. I was very keen obviously to discuss Ukraine, but there were many other issues that we got through.

Downing Street said Starmer had not raised the issue of Biden’s health or his future plans in their meeting, but reporters asked him about media speculation that Biden could have early dementia symptoms. Starmer said:

No, we had a really good bilateral yesterday. We were billed for 45 minutes, we went on for the best part of an hour. We went through a huge number of issues at pace, he was actually on really good form.

Joe Biden did not hear any concerns from world leaders during the Nato summit regarding his health or re-election campaign challenges, the White House said.

The White House’s national security adviser, Jake Sullivan, said leaders instead offered “a drumbeat of praise for the United States, but also for President Biden personally for what he’s done to strengthen Nato”, Associated Press reported.

Biden was praised not just for his time as president but for his decades in politics, Sullivan said.

Sullivan, who helped prepare Biden ahead of the disastrous debate performance, said he did not “have concerns” about the president’s health, adding:

He said he had a bad night.

Hello and welcome to our coverage of the Nato summit in Washington DC, where all eyes will be on Joe Biden this evening as he steps up to the lectern and answers questions from journalists in a critical test after his disastrous debate performance against Donald Trump a fortnight ago.

Biden is scheduled to begin speaking at 6.30pm ET to close out the three-day Nato summit in his first solo news conference in eight months, amid growing calls for him to step aside his Democratic party’s presumptive nominee.

The US president’s performance tonight will be closely watched by his aides and advisers, who have reportedly been discussing how to persuade him to leave the presidential race, as well as the Trump campaign who reportedly want him to stay.

We’ll stream Biden’s press conference here and bring you more news coming out of the Nato summit.