Biden’s Embarrassing Gaffe at NATO as He Calls Ukrainian President Zelenskyy ‘President Putin’

At the NATO summit, President Joe Biden made a hilarious gaffe as he identified Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy as "President Putin" by mistake. The humiliating semantic blunder comes as Biden is under severe scrutiny about his mental fitness. Though Biden swiftly turned things around, the gaffe was extremely embarrassing.

"And now I want to hand it over to the President of Ukraine, who has as much courage as he has determination," Biden said at the NATO event hosted in Washington, CNBC reported. "Ladies and gentlemen — President Putin. President Putin," Biden said, quickly realizing he'd stumbled. "He's gonna beat President Putin, President Zelenskyy," Biden said. Zelenskyy himself deftly handled the flub, joking, "I'm better." Biden responded, "You are a hell of a lot better."

The Biden-Harris campaign took to social media to share the gaffe themselves, seemingly trying to own the mistake- and the subsequent save. Biden's confusion of Zelenskyy with the Russian leader who has been waging a devastating war on Ukraine for over two years came less than an hour before he was set to appear for a scheduled news conference in Washington, D.C.

This would be Biden's first news conference since his strange, tardy debate with former President Donald Trump in late June. The news conference coincides with an increasing number of Democrats publicly urging Biden to withdraw from the race and make way for someone younger and sharper. For decades, Biden has struggled with stuttering. However, his latest debate with Trump, along with other recent blunders and moments of disorientation, have sparked worries that the 81-year-old, the oldest serving president of the United States, is showing signs of declining mental clarity.

At the subsequent news conference, Biden again mixed up names as he flubbed Trump's name with his Vice President, Kamala Harris. Responding to a question from Reuters about his confidence in Harris, Biden said, "Look, I wouldn't have picked Vice President Trump to be vice president if she was not qualified to be president. So start there." 

Reuters reported that the president coughed repeatedly and jumbled his remarks at the start of the press conference, and towards the conclusion, his answers regularly drifted off before he finished his thoughts. In contrast, he also was able to provide comprehensive answers about matters like the Israel-Gaza conflict and the necessity for Western nations to increase their military production to confront China and Russia.

Biden stated that his health was fine and that if his physicians advised it, he would undergo another neurological examination to assess his mental acuity. During the press conference, Biden claimed to be uniquely suited to defeat Trump, 78, and take over as president of the United States for a further four years by highlighting his decades of experience on the international scene. "The only thing age does is creates a little bit of wisdom if you pay attention," Biden said.