Joe Biden's slip of tongue has again become a subject of scrutiny. This time at the annual NATO summit being held in Vilnius, Lithuania.
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US President was caught in another embarrassing situation while addressing the press at a conference where he confused Ukranian President Zelensky with Russian President Vladimir Putin.
"Vladimir and I... I shouldn't be so familiar," President Biden uttered, mistakenly referring to President Zelensky as Vladimir, the name commonly associated with Russian President Vladimir Putin, an adversary to both Ukraine and the United States.
The slip-up caused a momentary hush in the room as the president realized his blunder. Sensing the error, Biden quickly corrected himself, "Mr. Zelensky and I talked about the kind of guarantees we could make in the meantime when I was in Ukraine and when we met in other places." His correction, however, did little to alleviate the awkwardness of the situation.
{{/usCountry}}The slip-up caused a momentary hush in the room as the president realized his blunder. Sensing the error, Biden quickly corrected himself, "Mr. Zelensky and I talked about the kind of guarantees we could make in the meantime when I was in Ukraine and when we met in other places." His correction, however, did little to alleviate the awkwardness of the situation.
{{/usCountry}}Though Candadian President didn't sky away from expressing feelings, he smiled as Biden corrected himself within few seconds.
Interestingly, the official White House transcript failed to capture Biden's misstep. Instead, it incorrectly recorded his reference to the Ukrainian president as "Volodymyr." In reality, "Volodymyr" and "Vladimir" were different variations of the same name, both meaning "ruler of the world" or "ruler of peace." While "Volodymyr" was the more commonly used variant in Ukraine, it was still an unfortunate mix-up on the part of President Biden.
This incident was not an isolated occurrence. The president has a history of making such gaffes when discussing Ukraine. In his 2022 State of the Union address, Biden mistakenly referred to "Ukrainians" as "Iranians" while discussing President Putin's invasion of Ukraine earlier that year.
In another instance, President Biden misspoke when he mentioned Russian troops withdrawing from "Fallujah," a city associated with the Iraq War. His intended reference was to the Ukrainian city of Kherson in the southeastern region of the country.
Such slip-ups have raised concerns and are becoming a fodder for the Republicans to question his ability to continue as the President of US, especially considering his advanced age.
Adding to the growing scrutiny, President Biden had notably skipped the opening dinner of the NATO leadership summit and White House staff attributed his absence to a busy workweek. The decision, however, did not go unnoticed, raising eyebrows among political observers.