During an appearance on CNN’s State of the Union this weekend, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) expertly shamed former President Donald Trump for his repeated capitulations to Russian President Vladimir Putin while in office. As president, Trump — among other examples — downplayed the threat of Russian meddling in U.S. elections, glossed over the Russian invasion of Ukraine’s Crimean peninsula with his call for Russia to rejoin the G7 group of nations, from which it had been expelled over the violence in Crimea, and more.
Pelosi noted that Putin would see a “contrast” when meeting with President Joe Biden. She also observed that Trump “kowtowed” and “catered to Putin in a way that was humiliating to the United States of America.” As she put it:
‘In terms of [Biden’s] meeting with Putin. I think that he should meet with him. They should have a line of communication, and issues like cybersecurity and energy of course — are not necessarily on the table in that meeting but are the reality that we have to deal with… The former president of the United States, for whatever reason — whether the Russians had personal, political, or financial leverage over him — just kowtowed, catered to Putin in a way that was humiliating to the United States of America. And when Putin hears about some of the violations of the rights of his own people, he laughs. This is a thug… I think he’s gonna meet a very different president than one who was at the mercy of Putin.’
Watch Pelosi below:
Pelosi on Putin: "This is a thug … I think he's gonna meet a very different president than the one who was at the mercy of Putin." pic.twitter.com/FfoX1NGPUJ
— Aaron Rupar (@atrupar) June 13, 2021
While overseas ahead of his Putin meeting, Biden has also met with other world leaders like British Prime Minister Boris Johnson and French President Emmanuel Macron. Asked over the weekend whether the U.S. appears “back” under Biden as the U.S. president has previously put it, Macron answered with a resounding “definitely.” Macron also said that he thinks it’s “great to have the U.S. president part of the club and willing to cooperate.” That starkly contrasts with the Trump era, when the then-president frequently occupied himself with posting whiny tweets about U.S. allies.
