White House aides say Biden’s pronouncements reflect that he’s never been one to hold his tongue through his five decades in Washington, even when it gets him into trouble.
By CALVIN WOODWARD and ZEKE MILLER
But in remarks in Iowa on Tuesday, Biden equated Russia’s mass killings of Ukrainian civilians to genocide and stuck with that position on his way back to Washington: “Yes, I called it genocide,” he affirmed. Lawyers will decide if Russia’s conduct met the international standard, the president added, but “it sure seems that way to me.”
At the White House last month, Biden said of Putin, “I think he is a war criminal,” in response to a shouted question as he walked out of an unrelated bill-signing reception. He said the same again when visiting U.S. troops in Poland.“He was speaking from his heart and speaking from what he’s seen on television, which is barbaric actions by a brutal dictator, through his invasion of a foreign country,” said press secretary Jen Psaki.
“We made a dramatic transition during the Trump presidency” in coming to realize that a president may not be speaking for the government or the country at times, but only for himself, said Kathleen Hall Jamieson, director of the Annenberg Public Policy Center at the University of Pennsylvania. She credits the Biden White House with being quick to set the record straight when that happens.
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