President Joe Biden called North Korean dictator Kim Jong Un president of South Korea at a closed-door fundraising event in San Francisco on Friday.
Biden, 81, was going after his 2024 rival, former President Donald Trump, for praising the North Korean leader after they met several times during the Republican’s administration.
The president spoke of Trump’s pride in South Korean President Kim Jong Un’s “love letters.”
South Korea’s president is Yoon Suk Yeol, with whom Biden has met several times, including a state dinner at the White House, an official trip to South Korea and a summit at Camp David, since Yoon was elected in 2022.
Since taking office, Biden has worked carefully to cultivate relationships with the leaders of South Korea and Japan to counter the rise of China.
President Joe Biden (R) walks with Rep. Anna Eschoo (R) before a fundraiser Friday in San Francisco. At the campaign event without cameras, Biden accidentally said that Kim Jong Un was the leader of South Korea.
Biden (left), 81, met South Korean President Yoon Suk Yeol (right) on several occasions, including a state dinner at the White House in April 2023. Yoon performed a rendition of American Don McClean’s foot at the glitzy White House meeting.
The gaffe comes a week after the president called Japan “xenophobic” at another private event with donors.
At a fundraiser at DC’s glitzy Mayflower Hotel to mark the start of Asian American, Native Hawaiian and Pacific Islander Heritage Month, the president spoke about why he believed the U.S. economy was stronger than that of several Asian nations.
Biden was trying to criticize former President Donald Trump for speaking out about the ‘love letters’ he exchanged with North Korean dictator Kim Jong Un (pictured)
‘Why is China stagnating so much economically? Why is Japan having problems? Why is it Russia? Why is India? Because they are xenophobic,” Biden said. “They don’t want immigrants,” the president surmised.
Following the “xenophobic” comment, White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre never said whether the president was serious.
“I think the broader, broader, broader argument that I was trying to make, that I think most, most leaders and allies around the world understand, is that I was trying… I was saying that when is about, when it comes to “When it comes to who we are as a nation, we are a nation of immigrants, that’s in our DNA,” he responded when asked if the snub was intentional and if Biden planned to apologize.
In the past, when Biden has made gaffes, Jean-Pierre pointed out how common it is for people to make language mistakes.
Voters, however, have been skeptical that Biden, the country’s oldest president, can seek a second term.
Biden’s campaign has tried to fight fire with fire, highlighting online when Trump makes a mistake or stumbles.
The president’s Kim Jong Un “oops” comes as the North Korean dictator was already in the news, over claims contained in Gov. Kristi Noem’s book that the two met face to face.
Noem, already embroiled in a dog-killing scandal, also came under fire when she said she had met Kim in person while serving in Congress in the pages of the new book.
His spokesperson has since told DailyMail.com that the passage is coming to light, blaming a ‘ghostwriter’.
“We have been informed that the upcoming book ‘No Going Back’ has two small errors,” said spokesman Ian Fury. “This has been communicated to the ghostwriter and editor.”
“Kim Jong Un was put on a list of world leaders and he shouldn’t have been,” Fury said.
Noem has also had a series of uncomfortable interviews, in which she refuses to say how the anecdote about her meeting with Kim appeared in the book.
