Donald Trump was back on his regular antics in Thursday night’s presidential debate, claiming Joe Biden was to blame for Russia’s invasion of Ukraine—a war Trump promised he’d have “settled” as president-elect should he win in November.
“I will have that war settled between [Vladimir] Putin and [Volodymyr] Zelensky as president-elect,” Trump said. “Before I take office on Jan. 20, I’ll have that war settled.”
Trump, 78, didn’t specify how he’d bring the years-long conflict to a screeching halt, but he took his fair share of shots at Biden and Ukraine’s president, Volodymyr Zelensky.
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“Every time Zelensky comes to this country he walks away with $60 billion,” Trump said. “He’s the greatest salesman ever.”
Trump has long aligned himself with Russia and its president, Vladimir Putin, claiming their relationship was the reason there was relative peace in the Middle East and Europe during his lone term in office.
Biden, 81, responded by calling Putin a war criminal and criticized Trump for commenting at a rally earlier this year that, as president, he’d encourage Russia to “do whatever the hell they want.”
“The fact is that Putin is a war criminal.” Biden said. “He wants all of Ukraine. That’s what he wants. And then you think he’ll stop there? Do you think he’ll stop if he takes Ukraine? What do you think happens to Poland, Belarus? What do you think happens to those NATO countries?”
In the same rant where he claimed he’d end the war in Ukraine, Trump also faulted Biden for the Oct. 7 massacre in Israel last year. That attack, which sparked a war in Gaza that’s left more than 37,500 Palestinians dead, would not have happened “in a million years” if Trump were president, he claimed.
In the same breath, Trump accused Biden of being too soft on Iran and claimed his alleged lack of pressure on them had emboldened Hamas into launching an attack on Israel. He also criticized Biden for how he pulled troops out of Afghanistan, saying that gaffe—which saw the Taliban return to power within days—is what proved to Putin that the U.S. was too weak to stop him from invading Ukraine.
“You had no terror at all under my administration,” Trump said. “This place, the whole world is blowing up under him.”
