HELSINKI, FINLAND: President Joe Biden is facing a backlash over a remark he directed at a Finnish reporter during a press conference in Helsinki. Responding to a query on Finland, the newest member of NATO, located barely 70 miles from Russia, the president reflected on uncertainty about the future of the alliance, telling journalist Iida Tikka of Finland’s public broadcaster YLE, "You can't tell me whether you're going to be able to go home tonight."
At the news conference with Finnish President Sauli Niinisto after his nation hurriedly joined the alliance in response to Russia's invasion of Ukraine, Biden declared, "We will stand together. No one can guarantee the future. But this is the best bet anyone can make."
He returned to his assertion of mutual commitment and collective defense, which is written in the NATO Charter, after responding to the issue of whether political divides in the US would in the future undercut whatever pledges Biden made.
Who is Iida Tikka?
Iida Tikka is a Finnish journalist who worked as a Moscow reporter before she enrolled at Georgetown. After reporting on Russia's military action in Eastern Ukraine, Tikka was determined to learn more about global security. To learn more about the subject, she pursued a master's degree at Georgetown's Security Studies Program (SSP) in Washington, DC. After taking SSP lessons that sparked her interest in the subject two years ago, Tikka is now graduating with knowledge in a new field - the geopolitics of energy, as reported by SFS.
'You can't tell me whether you're going to be able to go home tonight'
During the press conference, Tikka asked Biden, “What actions will you take to assure Finland that US will remain a reliable NATO partner for decades to come?” “I absolutely guarantee it,” Biden began, citing “overwhelming support” for NATO from the US public and Congress before adding, “no one can guarantee the future, but this is the best bet anyone could make.”
The reporter then asked Niinistö, “Hearing this answer that no one can guarantee a future, are you worried that the political instability in the US will cause issues in the alliance in the future?”
“Let me be clear,” Biden interjected, “I didn’t say we didn’t guarantee — we couldn’t guarantee the future. You can’t tell me whether you’re gonna be able to go home tonight. No one can be sure what they’re gonna do. I’m saying, as sure as anything could possibly be said about American foreign policy, we will stay connected to NATO."
Niinisto tried to lighten the mood by telling the reporter, “It seems that the president has answered your problems."
Senators Tim Kaine (D-Va) and Marco Rubio (R-Fla) have introduced a bipartisan measure that would forbid a president from leaving NATO without legislative permission.
'What a jerk'
After the news went on air, netizens criticized Biden for his statement. One user wrote, "When are the American people going to understand he has dementia and is not competent? The later in the day it gets the worse he gets which is a sign of sundowners syndrome. This is part of the diagnosis for dementia. I saw it with my Mother. Wake Up America." Another user wrote, "He is a nasty old coot." The last user wrote, "What a jerk".
