In an exclusive for The National Pulse, former White House stenographer Mike McCormick says that the Russians humiliated then-vice president Joe Biden in his 2011 meeting with then-prime minister Vladimir Putin.
McCormick knows because he was present at the meeting.
“As Joe Biden’s White House stenographer, I stood directly behind Putin at a distance of five feet. Biden, seated across from Putin at an elegant conference table, was about 12 feet from me,” McCormick said. “About 10 minutes into the meeting, Vice President Biden attempted to start lecturing about his decades-old part in U.S.-Russian negotiations with the dreaded phrase, ‘I’ve been around a long time. The first time I was here…’“
“And… cut.
“Joe Biden got about one sentence further into that spiel when off went his microphone, off went the lights for the TV cameras, and stern Russian voices were commanding the press to leave. And leave they did.”
Now that’s rough. But here was Biden’s reaction:
“Across the table, I could see Vice President of the United States Joe Biden, in the now dimly lit room, looking as duped as an exhausted fish in the bottom of a boat. No protest, no complaint. No, hey, I wasn’t finished. Nothing. He was humiliated,” McCormick added. “To me, the revelation was the premeditated precision of the snub. Putin or his team had likely plotted this all out. They knew exactly what bait to use, exactly how Joe Biden would take it, and then when he did, they reeled him helplessly in.”
McCormick then links to the official transcription over at the Obama White House Archives page. The Russians cut Biden off mid-sentence, only 12 minutes after the meeting had started.
McCormick has published a book titled Joe Biden Unauthorized, and this story is told in the chapter titled “B*tch Slapped in Moscow.”
In case you missed it, Putin decided to “go high” after Biden “went low” and wished him good health after he called Putin a “killer.”
