Biden calls Putin 'a crazy SOB' and ridicules Trump at San Francisco fundraiser
The president also said "nine heads of state" have privately told him they hope he is reelected "because my democracy is at stake if the other guy wins."
President Joe Biden called Russian President Vladimir Putin "a crazy SOB" and made fun of Donald Trump for comparing himself to Russian opposition leader Alexei Navalny at a fundraiser Wednesday night in San Francisco.
Biden largely focused on environmental concerns at the campaign event, while taking digs at Putin and Trump.
"We have a crazy SOB like that guy Putin, and others, and we always have to worry about nuclear conflict, but the existential threat to humanity is climate," he said according to a print pool report.
Biden then scoffed at Trump for comparing his legal troubles to the political persecution of Navalny, an outspoken Putin critic who died in a Russian prison last week. During a Fox News town hall Tuesday, Trump described the $350 million business fraud judgment he faces as "a form of Navalny."
Biden called Trump’s remarks unhinged. “If I stood here 10 to 15 years ago and said all this, you’d all think I should be committed," he said.
Trump’s campaign clapped back, saying Biden is the one who belongs in a psychiatric facility.
"Crooked Joe Biden is saying the quiet part out loud, he should be committed because of the total failure he has been for this country, and the misery and destruction he has caused," a Trump spokesperson told POLITICO in a statement.
Biden also said that when he meets with other heads of state they quietly tell him they're rooting for his reelection.
“As I walk out of meetings, a head of state will find an excuse to come up close … and say, 'You’ve got to win.' Not because I’m so special. 'You’ve got to win because my democracy is at stake if the other guy wins.' Nine heads of state have done that with me,” Biden said.
After condemning Trump, Biden moved on to the broader Republican Party, saying the GOP has lost their “American moral center.”
He crowned Rep. Nancy Pelosi, who was in attendance at the San Francisco event, the “best speaker there has ever been.”
The president eventually circled back to climate change, saying he has a long personal history with environmental issues since his childhood in Scranton, Pennsylvania where the family home had a coal furnace. He attributed his asthma to his upbringing in a heavily polluted Delaware town.
But, Biden said he's optimistic about his administration's environmental agenda.
“We don’t have to convince people anymore there is climate change," he said.
