Most children would dream of meeting the leader of the free world in person.
But this little girl looked mortified when Joe Biden pretended to devour and sniff her during a bizarre exchange in Finland.
The 80-year-old president was caught engaging with his mother and daughter as he prepared to fly back to the US from Europe.
Biden was in Helsinki after the NATO summit in Lithuania, where he was also criticized for making a creepy comment to a Finnish reporter.
It’s the latest bizarre clip from the president, who has often raised questions about his interactions with youth in the past.
The 80-year-old president was caught up in the bizarre mother-daughter interaction as he prepared to fly back to the US from Europe
Footage showed Biden leaning on the young girl in her mother’s arms on the tarmac at Helsinki Airport.
He moved his mouth towards the child in a slurping motion before resting it on her shoulder and continuing to nibble.
The girl’s mother and a man watching laughed at the president, but the child looked at him in horror and scowled as he backed away.
She continued to squirm and turned her back on the Supreme Commander while her mother tried to take a selfie.
Meanwhile, Biden kept making faces before attempting to sniff her head or caress her.
Eventually he walked away before being greeted by other viewers hoping to snap a photo with him. The girl continued to sulk in her mother’s arms.
Biden had been in Europe for the NATO summit in Lithuania before flying to Finland, where he was criticized for making a creepy comment to a Finnish female reporter
The president was widely mocked on social media after the video surfaced on Friday afternoon.
Some called the interaction “strange,” while others even called for placement in a nursing home.
“That’s pretty weird,” Republican Rep. Matt Gaetz tweeted alongside the clip.
“Oops,” added Republican Senator Ted Cruz. “Biden should be in a nursing home, not leading the free world,” Donald Trump Jr. tweeted.
Conservative activist Caleb Hull said, “This has to be Biden’s scariest moment with a child yet.” “All Biden has to do is not to do this, and he can’t.”
Biden had been in Europe for the NATO summit in Lithuania before flying to Finland, where he was criticized for making a creepy comment to a Finnish female reporter
This comes after Biden also got into trouble over a bizarre comment he made to a Finnish reporter.
Reflecting on the uncertainty and his fatalism, he asked a question about NATO’s newest member, Finland, located just 70 miles from Russia.
“We will stand together,” he said at a news conference with Finnish President Sauli Niinisto after the country rushed to join the alliance following Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.
“No one can guarantee the future.” “But that’s the best bet you can make,” he qualified.
After answering the question of whether future US political divisions could undermine the commitments made by Biden, he returned to his declaration of mutual obligation and collective defense enshrined in the NATO charter.
President Biden told a Finnish reporter that she might not make it home tonight when asked about the nature of the guarantees for Finland’s security
He did so even when the Finnish President began answering a similar question.
“Let me be clear,” Biden told Lida Tikka, the DC correspondent for Finnish public broadcaster YLE. “I didn’t say we can’t guarantee the future.”
“You can’t tell me if you can go home tonight.” Nobody can be sure what he will do.
“I say as confidently as anyone can say about American foreign policy: we will remain committed to NATO, end to end and end.” “We are a transatlantic partnership.”
The Finnish President added: “It seems that the President has solved your problems.” “I have no reason to doubt the future US policy,” Niinisto added.
Biden had to ask his questioner to repeat her request after she referred to a bipartisan bill by Senators Marco Rubio (R-Fla.) and Tim Kaine (D-Va.) designed to prevent a president from being ousted without Congressional approval exit from NATO.
Biden had previously stated, “The United States is committed to Finland and to NATO, and those commitments are rock solid.”
He pledged to “protect every inch of NATO territory, and of course that includes Finland,” he said.
Iceland’s Prime Minister Katrin Jakobsdottir (l) listens to Norwegian Prime Minister Jonas Gahr Store during the US-Nordic Leaders’ Summit. Biden corrected himself after mentioning the head of Ireland instead of Iceland
The assurances came during a press conference that was about mutual compliments, but at which Biden had to ask for a repeat of the questions.
He also had to correct himself after accidentally speaking of the head of Ireland instead of the head of Iceland after meeting with a group of Norse nations.
“You can tell that’s a Freudian slip.” I’m thinking of “home,” he said.
He had just called Icelandic Prime Minister Katrin Jakobsdottir a “daughter of Ireland” before catching himself. His last trip abroad took him to Ireland, where his ancestors are rooted.
It all took place in the same room at the Presidential Palace where Donald Trump appeared to side with Vladimir Putin in 2018 and took assurances from the Russian leader that he had not interfered in the 2016 election.
Biden also expressed his “unwavering support” for the “brave people of Ukraine” after coming from a NATO summit in Vilnius, where Ukraine received fresh assurances about joining NATO but not the timeline for the invitation to that President Volodymyr Zelenskyy had striven for.
He said he didn’t think Russia’s war could “go on for years” or that Russia could sustain it forever due to limited “resource capacity.”
Russia has endured Western sanctions but appears to have problems with arms, ammunition and troops being sacrificed in the “meat grinder” of the Ukraine invasion.
Sweden’s Prime Minister Ulf Kristersson, Denmark’s Prime Minister Mette Frederiksen, US President Joe Biden, Finland’s President Sauli Niinisto and Iceland’s Prime Minister Katrin Jakobsdottir react during a family photo session of the US-Nordic Summit at the Presidential Palace in Helsinki, Finland, July 13, 2023. The Nordic States and heads of government are working on mutual security guarantees
Later, in response to a US question, Biden revealed in his response to a question about Russian President Vladimir Putin that the US was not certain of the whereabouts of mutineer Yevgeny Prigozhin, Wagner’s private military boss, who was leading a column headed for Moscow know make a deal and back off.
He was asked about the reappearance of Russian military chief of staff Valery Gerasimov, while examining how Putin will respond to threats to his leadership and top commanders.
“God only knows what he’s likely to do,” Biden said. “We’re not even sure where he is and what his relationship is,” he said of Prigozhin, who made a deal for a sanctuary in Belarus but met with Putin there, according to the Kremlin.
“If I were him, I would be careful about what I eat and keep an eye on the menu,” Biden said in his second part of the press event’s black humor.
When asked about Russian interference in US elections, he replied: They are already interfering. That would be nothing new.’
It came so close to him that he was referring here to the 2018 Trump-Putin press conference, in which Trump accepted Putin’s denial of interference in the 2016 election.
Responding to fears that a weakened Putin might strike with nuclear weapons, Biden said, “I don’t think there’s any real prospect of that.” “You never know that Putin will use nuclear weapons.”
None of the men called Putin by his name. The Finnish President called him “our neighbor”. Biden called him “the gentleman who sits across the border in Moscow.”
Biden had a blunt assessment of whether Putin could prevail and how long it would take to finish.
“Putin has already lost the war,” he said amid Ukraine’s uphill fighting to reclaim territory. “There’s no chance he’ll win,” Biden said.
He said Russia’s resources would be exhausted. “But I can’t predict exactly how that’s going to happen.”