President Biden wasted no time blasting former President Donald Trump in his State of the Union speech Thursday, forcefully condemning his predecessor’s remarks about NATO as outrageous, dangerous and unacceptable.
In the first few minutes of his remarks, Mr. Biden referred to Mr. Trump’s comments about what he would do if NATO countries were “delinquent” in paying their share of the alliance’s military burdens. Mr. Trump said that he would tell Russia “to do whatever the hell they want.”
Mr. Biden, in the first of numerous references to Mr. Trump, won lengthy, standing applause from Democratic lawmakers with several of them.
“Now my predecessor, a former Republican president, tells Putin, ‘do whatever the hell you want.’ That’s a quote. A former president bowing down to a Russian leader. I think that’s outrageous, it’s dangerous and it’s unacceptable,” he said.
Mr. Biden sought to contrast Mr. Trump, the presumptive GOP presidential nominee, with a Republican icon — former President Ronald Reagan.
He aggressively invoked Reagan’s famous speech in which told Soviet President Mikhail Gorbachev to “tear down” the Berlin Wall separating East Germany and West Germany.
Although Mr. Biden aggressively went after Mr. Trump, he did not utter his name. Instead, he repeatedly referred to a “Republican president” and “my predecessor.”
• Jeff Mordock can be reached at jmordock@washingtontimes.com.
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