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Any Moment, Biden News Conference from NATO Headquarters; Biden Holds News Conference after Emergency NATO Meeting. Aired 1:30-2p ET

Aired March 24, 2022 - 13:30   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

[13:30:00]

MAJ. GEN. JAMES "SPIDER" MARKS, CNN MILITARY ANALYST: They know -- they may know thou fly an aircraft but they don't understand the purpose that aircraft can provide to the totality of the fight, this conventional fight, which is what it's all about.

DON LEMON, CNN HOST: All right. General, thank you. Appreciate it. We'll see you very soon here on CNN.

I want to get to my colleague, Wolf Blitzer. He is in Brussels -- Wolf?

WOLF BLITZER, CNN HOST: All right, Don, thank you very much.

Yes, we're here in Brussels, right across -- right in front of the European Union, the European Council areas where the president has been holding summit talks as well.

He's over at NATO headquarters right now. I just came from there. He's about to have this news conference. We expect to learn new information from the president of the United States in the next few minutes.

This is a truly historic moment at stake.

The population of Ukraine, about 44 million people live there. Maybe 10 million have been displaced already from their own homes. And 3.5 million of them have fled the country.

We're watching what's going on. Phil Mattingly is our White House correspondent.

Phil, you are getting more information from your sources about what we should anticipate here. Tell our viewers what you are learning, what we should brace to hear from the president.

PHIL MATTINGLY, CNN SENIOR WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: Wolf, I think one of the interesting things is this press conference is going to be earlier than we expected it to.

In fact, the trio of kind of snap summits the president was having back-to-back-to-back or scheduled to have back-to-back-to-back over the course of the day appears to have been thrown off a little bit.

He met with NATO leaders this morning. He met with G-7 leaders earlier today.

But something, Wolf, you know very well that happens at summits like this or international engagements is there are side meetings.

The president has had side meeting -- on the sidelines with French President Emmanuel Macron, obviously, a critical player.

Someone who has been having regular direct communications with Russian President Putin as well as President Zelenskyy and doing communications with the White House as well.

And he's also spoken with the Japanese prime minister on the sidelines. That's multi-faceted, Wolf.

We've seen the North Korean missile test that I think brought a lot of concern here with U.S. officials but also with their international counterparts, certainly with the Japanese.

But also the Japanese have been critical allies when it comes to the Ukrainian response.

Some officials I think were actually surprised on the U.S. side of things at how willing the Japanese have been to really be forward on the front feet in terms of complying and working with and imposing their own sanctions at a very significant scale.

Those meetings appear to have somewhat bumped things off track a little with the third meeting with the European Council. So we expect the president to --

(CROSSTALK)

BLITZER: All right, hold on for a moment.

Here comes the president of the United States. He will open with a statement and then take questions.

JOE BIDEN, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: All the press is here. You must be getting very tired. Am I the 16th or 17th?

Anyway, all kidding aside, thank you for taking the time.

Today marks one month since Russia began its carnage in Ukraine, the brutal invasion of Ukraine. And we held a NATO summit the very next day.

At that time, my overwhelming objective in wanting that summit was to have absolute unity on three key, important issues among our NATO and European allies.

First was to support Ukraine with military and humanitarian assistance.

Second was to impose the most significant, the most significant sanctions, economic sanctions regime ever in order to cripple Putin's economy and punish him for his actions. Third was to fortify the eastern flank of our NATO allies who were

obviously very, very concerned and somewhat at -- worried what would happen.

We accomplished all three of these. Today we're determined to sustain those efforts and to build on them.

The United States is committed to provide over $2 billion in military equipment to Ukraine since I became president. Anti-air systems, anti- armor systems, ammunition. And our weapons are flowing into Ukraine as I speak.

And today, I am announcing the United States are prepared to commit more than $1 billion in humanitarian assistance to help get relief to millions of Ukrainians affected by the war in Ukraine.

Many Ukrainian refugees will wish to stay in Europe, closer to their homes. But we've also will welcome 100,000 Ukrainians to the United States with the focus on reuniting families.

And we will invest $320 million to bolster democratic resilience and defend human rights in Ukraine and neighboring countries.

We're also coordinating with the G-7 and the European Union on food security as well as energy security. I'll have more to say about that tomorrow.

We're also announcing new sanctions of more than 400 individuals and entities aligned with -- in alignment with the European Union, more than 300 members of the Duma, oligarchs and Russian defense companies that fuel the Russian war machine.

[13:35:08]

In addition to the 100,000 U.S. forces now stationed in Europe to defend NATO territory, NATO established, as you already know, four new battle groups in Romania, Hungary, Bulgaria and Slovakia to reinforce the eastern front.

Putin was banking on NATO being split. My early conversations with him in December and early January was clear to me he didn't think we could sustain this cohesion.

NATO has never, never been more united than it is today.

Putin is getting the opposite what he intended to have as a consequence of going into Ukraine.

We've built that same unity with the European Union and with the leading democracies of the G-7.

So I want to thank you, and I'll be now happy to take your questions.

Since there's so many people out there, I'm going to -- I've been given a list.

How about Chris of the Associated Press, first question.

CHRIS MEGERIAN, WHITE HOUSE REPORTER, ASSOCIATED PRESS: Thank you, Mr. President.

So you've warned about the real threat of chemical weapons being used. Have you gathered specific intelligence that suggests that President Putin is deploying these weapons, moving them into position or considering their use?

And would the U.S. or NATO respond with military action if he did use chemical weapons?

BIDEN: You know, on the first question, I can't answer that. I'm not going to give you intelligence data, number one.

Number two, we would respond. We would respond if he uses it. The nature of the response would depend on the nature of the use.

Josh of Bloomberg.

JOSH WINGROVE, WHITE HOUSE REPORTER, BLOOMBERG: Thank you very much.

BIDEN: If I had your voice, I'd have been elected earlier.

(LAUGHTER)

WINGROVE: It's got a long arm.

Thank you.

Can you talk about two things, sir?

One, since your conversation with President Xi of China, have you seen any indications of action or lack of action from China that has led you to believe whether they will intervene and help Russia with the sale of arms or the provision of supplies to support this war in Ukraine?

And secondly, can you say whether the conversation today turned to the subject of food shortages and what the U.S. will do to address wheat shortages in particular as a result of this forum?

Thank you.

BIDEN: On the first question, relating to President Xi Jinping of China, I had a very straightforward conversation with Xi -- now I guess it's six days ago? Seven days ago, in that range?

And I made it clear to him -- I made no threats but I made it clear to him that make sure he understood the consequences of him helping Russia as had been reported and was expected.

And I made no threats but I pointed out the number of American and foreign corporations that left Russia as a consequence of their barbaric behavior. And I indicated that I knew how much he -- because we had long discussions in the past about his interest in making sure he had economic relations and economic growth with Europe and the United States.

And indicated that he'd be putting himself at significant jeopardy in those aims, if, in fact, he were to move forward.

I am not going to comment on any detail about what we know or don't know as a consequence of that conversation.

But tomorrow -- is it tomorrow or next Monday that Ursula is having that conference with China?

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: (INAUDIBLE)

BIDEN: The 1st? On April 1st?

We've had discussions because I think that China understands that its economic future is much more closely tied to the West than it is to Russia. And so I am hopeful that he does not get engaged.

We also did discuss today that there's a need for us to set up, NATO to set up and the E.U. to set up a system whereby we have an organization looking at who has violated any of the sanctions and where and when and how they violated them.

And that's something we're going to put in train. It's not done yet.

So with regard to Xi, I have nothing more to report.

With regard to food shortages, yes, we did -- we did talk about food shortages. And it's going to be real.

[13:39:59]

The price of the sanctions is not just imposed upon Russia. It's imposed upon an awful lot of countries as well, including European countries and our country as well.

And because both Russia and Ukraine have been the breadbasket of Europe in terms of wheat, for example -- to give you one example.

But we had a long discussion in the G-7 with the -- with both the United States, which has a significant -- the third-largest producer of wheat in the world, as well as Canada, which is also a major, major producer.

And we both talked about how we could increase and disseminate more rapidly food shortages.

In addition to that, we talked about urging all the European countries and everyone else to end trade restrictions on sending -- limitations on sending food abroad.

So we are in the process of working out with our European friends what it would be -- what it would take to help alleviate the concerns relative to food shortages.

We also talked about a significant major U.S. investment, among others, in terms of providing for the need for humanitarian assistance, including food as we move forward.

Terena of "The Wall Street Journal."

Watch you don't get hit in the head there now.

(LAUGHTER)

UNIDENTIFIED REPORTER: Mr. President, in your view, does President Zelenskyy need to cede any Ukrainian territory in order to gain a ceasefire with Russia or is that completely off the table?

And also, do you think that Russia needs to be removed from the G-20?

BIDEN: On the latter point, my answer is, yes. It depends on the G-20.

I -- that was raised today. And I raised the possibility, if that can't be done, if Indonesia and others do not agree, then we should, in my view, ask to have both Ukraine be able to attend the meetings as well as -- basically, Ukraine being able to attend the G-20 and observe.

With regard to -- what was the first question?

UNIDENTIFIED REPORTER: If you think that Ukrainians need to cede -- give up any territory in order to get --

BIDEN: That's a total judgment based on Ukraine. Nothing about Ukraine without Ukraine.

I don't believe that they are going to have to do that, but that's a judgment. There's negotiations, there are discussions, I should say, that have taken place that I've not been part of, including the Ukrainians. And it's their judgment to make.

Cecilia, ABC.

There you are.

Oh.

(LAUGHTER)

CECILIA VEGA, WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT, ABC NEWS: Thank you.

Sir, you've made it very clear in this conflict that you do not want to see World War III. But is it possible that in expressing that so early that you were too quick to rule out direct military intervention in this war?

Could Putin have been emboldened knowing that you are not going to get involved directly in this conflict?

BIDEN: No and no.

VEGA: You don't believe that?

And to clarify, on chemical weapons, if chemical weapons were used in Ukraine, would that trigger a military response from NATO?

BIDEN: It would trigger a response in kind. Whether or not you're asking whether NATO would cross -- we'd make that decision at the time.

VEGA: My final question, because you are heading to Poland tomorrow, do you think that getting a firsthand look at the effects of this war on these millions of Ukrainians who have fled their country could change the way that you might respond?

BIDEN: I don't think so because I've been to many, many war zones. I've been in refugee camps. I've been in war zones for the last 15 years. And it's -- it's devastating.

And but the thing you look at the most is you see these young children. You see children without parents that are in those camps or refugees.

You see women and husbands and men and women who are completely lost and have no -- you see that blank look on their face, that absolute feeling of, my god, where am I? What's going to happen to me?

And so it -- what it will do, it will reinforce my commitment to have the United States make sure we are a major piece of dealing with the relocation of all those folks, as well as humanitarian assistance needed both inside Ukraine and outside Ukraine.

For example, this is not something that Poland or Romania or Germany should carry on their own. This is an international responsibility.

[13:45:05]

The United States is the leader of -- one of the leaders in the international community. Has an obligation to be engaged.

To be engaged and do all we can to ease the suffering and pain of innocent women and children and men for that matter throughout Ukraine and those who have made it across the border. I plan on attempting to see those folks.

As well as I hope I'm going to be able to see -- I guess I'm not supposed to say where I'm going, am I?

(LAUGHTER)

BIDEN: But anyway, I hope I get to see a lot of people.

(LAUGHTER)

BIDEN: Marcus (ph) of "Der Spiegel?"

UNIDENTIFIED REPORTER: Thanks, Mr. President.

There's a presidential election coming up in 2024. And as you know --

BIDEN: You're kidding.

(LAUGHTER)

UNIDENTIFIED REPORTER: Yes, it's true.

And there are widespread concerns in Europe that a figure like your predecessor, maybe even your predecessor himself, might get elected president again.

So are there any steps, anything you are trying to do and NATO is trying to do here these days to prevent what you're trying to do becoming undone two years from now?

Thank you.

BIDEN: No, that's not how I think of this. I've been dealing with foreign policy for longer than anybody that's involved in this process right now.

I have no concerns about the impact -- I made a commitment when I ran this time. I wasn't going to run again. And I mean that sincerely. I had no intention of running for president again.

And until I saw those folks coming out of the fields in Virginia carrying torches and carrying Nazi banners and literally singing the same vile rhyme they used in Germany in the early '20s, or '30s, I should say.

And then when the gentlemen you mentioned was asked what he thought -- and a young woman was killed, a protester -- and he asked -- was asked what he thought, he said, they're very good people on both sides.

And that's when I decided I wasn't going to be quiet any longer.

And when I ran this time -- and I think the American press, whether they look at me favorably or unfavorably, will acknowledge this.

I made a determination. Nothing is worth -- no election is worth my not doing exactly what I think is the right thing. Not a joke. I'm too long in the tooth to fool with this any longer.

And so we are a long way off on elections. A long way off.

My focus, in any election, is making sure we retain the House and the United States Senate.

So that I have the room to continue to do the things that I've been able to do, in terms of grow the economy and deal in a rational way with American foreign policy and lead the world, lead -- be the leader of the free world.

So -- but it's not an illogical question for someone to ask. I say to people at home, imagine if we sat and watched the doors of

the Bundestag broken down and police officers killed and hundreds of people storming in.

Or imagine if we saw that happen in another British parliament or whatever. How would we feel?

And one of the things that I take some solace from is I don't think you'll find any European leader who thinks that I am not up to the job. And I mean that sincerely. It's not like, whoa.

The point is that when the first G-7 meeting I attended, like the one I did today, was in Great Britain. And I sat down and I said, America is back.

And one of the -- one of my counterparts, colleagues, head of state said, for how long? For how long?

And so I don't blame -- I don't criticize anybody for asking that question. But the next election, I'd be very fortunate if I had that same man running against me.

(CROSSTALK)

UNIDENTIFIED REPORTER: Thank you very, very much.

UNIDENTIFIED REPORTER: Mr. President --

(CROSSTALK)

BIDEN: Whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa.

Yes, one final question. Right.

(CROSSTALK)

BIDEN: Hey, wait. Hold on a second, please.

I was supposed to be an hour ago at the European Union meeting. And to speak.

(CROSSTALK)

BIDEN: (INAUDIBLE)

Someone I haven't called on before.

You. Who are you?

CHRISTINA RUFFINI, WASHINGTON CORRESPONDENT, CBS NEWS: I'm Christina Ruffini from CBS.

BIDEN: OK.

RUFFINI: Thank you, sir.

Deterrence didn't work. What makes you think Vladimir Putin will alter course based on the action you've taken today.

[13:50:00]

BIDEN: Let's get something straight. You remember, if you covered me from the very beginning, I did not say that, in fact, the sanctions would deter him.

Sanctions never deter. You keep talking about that. Sanctions never deter.

The maintenance of sanctions, the maintenance of sanctions, the increasing the pain, and the demonstration why I asked for this NATO meeting today is to be sure that after a month, we will sustain what we're doing/

Not just next month, the following month, but for the remainder of this entire year. That's what will stop him.

RUFFINI: Do you believe the action today will have an impact on making Russia change course in Ukraine?

BIDEN: That's not what I said. You're playing a game with me. I know. The answer is no.

I think what happens is we have to demonstrate -- the purpose -- the single most-important thing is for us to stay unified, and the world continue to focus on what a brute this guy is.

And all the innocent people's lives are being lost and ruined, and what's going on. That's the important thing.

But look, if you're Putin, and you think that the -- that Europe is going to crack in a month or six weeks or two months, why not -- they can take anything for another month.

But we have to demonstrate -- the reason I asked for the meeting, we have to stay fully, totally, thoroughly united.

Thank you.

(CROSSTALK)

BLITZER: All right, so, there you have the president of the United States. A relatively short news conference, less than a half an hour. He answered a few questions from reporters, made an important opening statement.

Once again, we want to welcome our viewers in the United States and around the world. I'm Wolf Blitzer reporting live from Brussels, Belgium.

The president making some significant news. We've got reporters and analysts all standing by to get an assessment of what we have just learned.

I want to bring in Phil Mattingly, our senior White House correspondent.

Phil, there's several things jumped out at me. But one of the most important was the president seemed to be hinting that when he heads to Poland tomorrow -- he'll be in Poland Friday and Saturday -- he may, repeat, may find some sort of way to meet with President Zelenskyy of Ukraine.

Now, doesn't necessarily mean he's going to go into Ukraine, maybe along the border some place. But what are you hearing?

MATTINGLY: Yes, Wolf, White House officials have been very tight- lipped about what that schedule is going to look like.

There has been some sense there would be efforts to meet with refugees. Certainly, other U.S. officials, Secretary of State Antony Blinken, is the one that comes to mind, have been close to the border, nearly on the border and met with Ukrainian officials.

I think U.S. officials have been trying to figure out how to do this. And Wolf, you know as well as anybody, having covered the White House as long as you did, that this is a very complex issue when it comes to security, when it comes to footprint.

And so what this is actually going to entail, I think, is still an open question right now.

But it underscores the efforts that have been put in to these three or four days on the ground here in Europe.

As we've seen over the course of the day, the president, during that news conference, saying a couple things that I think really stood out to me.

One, that there would -- there would be a response if President Putin decides to deploy chemical weapons.

The president would not go into any of the intelligence he's seen related to that, which has been a serious concern of U.S. officials over the course of the last several weeks, and a serious point of discussion here in Brussels between NATO allies and the G-7 as well.

But he did say there would be the response. As to the response itself, the nature of the response would depend on the nature of the use, according to the president.

The president also said, in his personal opinion, Russia should be kicked out of the G-20. That's a collective decision to be made.

And the president said if that was a decision they couldn't make collectively, then at least Ukraine should be allowed to attend any G- 20 meetings.

But that is another substantial statement by the president as he continues to do pretty much everything in his power to try and isolate the country -- or to try and isolate Russia.

But, Wolf, I think what I was also struck by was, at the end, when the president was talking about the overarching goal here.

When you talk to U.S. officials, yes, they are unveiling a sweeping new set of sanctions, more than 400 individuals and entities, going after economic sectors, making clear the Russian central bank can't do transactions in gold, which is huge to their foreign reserve.

But is the overarching goal of maintaining the unified approach that they have had up to this point.

And the reason why is this. And the president alluded to it in that statement. This is going to take a long time.

When you talk to U.S. officials, this is going to be a slog over the course of the weeks and months. And they need endurance in terms of the unity that has been shown over the course of the last four weeks.

And so more than anything else, yes, there are policy decisions, the humanitarian aid, the commitments on refugees in particular, extraordinarily important, given what we have seen millions of people crossing the border into eastern European countries.

But keeping this alliance together, this kind of unprecedented collection of democratic nations together, sustained, and working together on sanctions that have a real painful impact on their own domestic economies is critical.

[13:55:05]

And that is something that the president has made clear was a point of this trip.

But also something that U.S. officials are going to be working on just in a pretty much real-time basis over the course of the next several weeks and months -- Wolf?

BLITZER: He also stressed there would be consequences for China if China were to continue to provide extensive military assistance or other assistance to Russia as well.

Fred Pleitgen is joining us from Kyiv in Ukraine right now, our senior international correspondent.

How do you think, Fred, what we just heard in these opening statements and the question-and-answer session from President Biden, how do you think they're going to be received where you are in Ukraine from average folks as well as from President Zelenskyy and the political leadership?

FRED PLEITGEN, CNN SENIOR INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Well, first of all, Wolf, I think that the average folks here in Ukraine, they certainly understand that the U.S. is providing a lot of help to the Ukrainians.

And also, they really value the solidarity that there's among NATO nations, among western nations in general.

But of course, they want more than what's been offered so far.

And I think one of the things that we have to keep in mind, especially, for instance, when we look at President Zelenskyy of Ukraine, who sometimes, you know, sounds like he's sort of losing patience with the West, sometimes sounds like he's almost angry at the West.

He does, obviously, very much value the aid that Ukraine is getting. But he keeps saying, flat-out -- he's very honest about it -- look, right now, Ukraine is fighting for survival.

And so they're not going to hold back. They're going to be very straightforward with the things they want and with the things that they believe they're not getting yet.

One of the things, of course, was, first and foremost, a no-fly zone that they were asking for. We know now that that is off the table. In fact, President Zelenskyy not even asking for it anymore.

But they want more weapons, that's something we've heard from the Ukrainians. They say, look, you've seen how the Ukrainian army, the Ukrainian military has stood up to the Russians, has managed to halt the Russians.

Like, for instance, here in Kyiv, where I am right now and where we can literally hear the battle thuds as President Biden was speaking there at that press conference.

But the Ukrainians are also saying, make no mistake, there's attrition on their side as well.

And it comes in their air forces. Both if you look at the aircraft that they have and also at even more so the surface-to-air missile systems that they have been deploying. They say they need more, longer-range surface-to-air missile systems.

It was interesting because the mayor of Kyiv was saying, if you give us this stuff, we're going to make sure the sky is closed ourselves.

But right now, they believe they're not getting enough and they want more and they certainly are going to be asking for more.

The other thing -- and I think this is absolutely key -- that President Zelenskyy has said, other Ukrainian officials have also said, they want much tougher sanctions against the Russians.

They want the Russians to not be able to export any more gas and oil to any countries that are members of NATO or the European Union.

Of course, there are still European countries -- and I think President Biden's been alluding to this over the past couple of days -- that obviously have a very different energy situation than the U.S. does.

You look at Germany, some of the other European countries, they are still importing Russian gas on a pretty big scale and paying Russia for that. And the Ukrainians are saying, look, the more that you pay the Russians, all that money or a lot of that money is going to go to funding this war by Vladimir Putin and Ukrainians are going to die.

So of course, they have no patience for that. They want that to end. Even though, of course, they're not oblivious to the political realities of NATO member states.

And, you know, one thing that we keep hearing again -- and I think President Zelenskyy said in an address, actually, to German parliament not so long ago -- the Ukrainians very much value what the U.S. is doing.

And they said, how can it be that a country like the United States that's thousands of miles away does so much more to support Ukraine than countries that are so close, like, for instance, Germany and other European countries as well?

So, clearly, the aid is valued. The support is valued. The political support is valued.

But of course, the Ukrainian want more as they are in what they say is very much a battle for their survival -- Wolf?

BLITZER: Yes. This is a battle for survival for the Ukrainian people and the country of Ukraine right now, given this Russian assault.

Kaitlan Collins is our chief White House correspondent.

Kaitlan, you were in that room where the president held the news conference. He did it earlier than had been earlier announced by the White House.

Several points, of course, jumped out at me, including the fact that he confirmed what you have been reporting throughout this day, that the United States will now allow 100,000 Ukrainian refugees to come to the United States.

And some perspective, this past year, less than 100,000 refugees from around the world were allowed to come to the United States.

KAITLAN COLLINS, CNN CHIEF WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: Yes, it's quite a statement that the United States is making by putting that number on there.

It's not clear if they'll actually get to that number, of course, Wolf, but that is something that the White House is prepared to say, that they are ready to take up to 100,000 Ukrainian refugees.

Of course, we've seen over 3.5 million people flee Ukraine since this invasion started.

[13:59:56]

The president and his team seem to think that, right now, based on the where things stand between Russia and Ukraine, there's no end in sight to this, so who knows how many more there could be.

And so that is something that the White House is saying, they will take up to 100,000 Ukrainian refugees.