President Joe Biden and Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida met Thursday to try and showcase the power of the United States in the Pacific to a growing threat from China.
Predictably, Biden walked the wrong way onstage.
That’s a literal stage, not just our nation’s place on the world stage.
At the summit, Biden stood next to allied leaders like U.K. Prime Minister Rishi Sunak, Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, French President Emmanuel Macron, and others.
Afterward, Trudeau and the others started walking to their right. Biden stayed put, looked around, and pointed quizzically in different directions.
Trudeau seemed visibly puzzled during Biden’s senior moment.
Through this gaffe, Biden called to mind last year’s viral video of him appearing to shake hands with thin air (or perhaps making an ill-advised gesture at the audience).
Take a look —
Yes — that way, Joe! pic.twitter.com/t7IGypV45Q
— RNC Research (@RNCResearch) May 20, 2023
Biden recalled that Kishida said during a January Washington visit that the world faced one of the “most complex” security environments in recent history.
“I couldn’t agree with you more,” Biden told the Japanese prime minister as they sat with their aides at a conference table. “When our countries stand together, we stand stronger and I believe the whole world is safer when we do.”
Kishida noted that the global tensions had brought the U.S. and Japan closer together, that “the cooperation has evolved in leaps and bounds.”
Biden is also appearing on the world stage while trying to manage a divide back in the U.S. on how to raise the government’s debt limit. He opted to cut short what was supposed to be an eight-day trip to Asia, so he could return to Washington to try to avoid a potentially catastrophic default in June that could ripple across the global economy.
The Horn editorial team and the Associated Press contributed to this article.