Fox News White House correspondent Peter Doocy hit President Joe Biden with three questions Thursday after his national address regarding Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.
Following Russian President Vladimir Putin’s order for a special military operation in Ukraine’s eastern Donbas region Wednesday evening, Russian forces launched a bombing campaign in several parts of Ukraine early Thursday morning. The invasion directly led to crude oil prices soaring to $101.66 per barrel Thursday morning, its highest levels since 2014.
“Markets are down and gas prices are up,” Doocy began. “I know you always stress the difference between Wall Street and Main Street, but everybody seems to be in for some economic pain. How economically painful is it going to get for people in this country?”
“There’s no doubt that when a major nuclear power attacks and invades another country that the world is going to respond, and markets are going to respond all over the world,” Biden replied. “The notion that this is going to last for a long time is highly unlikely and as long as we continue to stay resolved in imposing sanctions we’re going to impose on Russia, period.”
Doocy then asked Biden if he underestimated Russian President Vladimir Putin and if he continues to view Putin as a “worthy adversary.” (RELATED: Doocy Cranks Up The Heat On Psaki As Energy Costs Rise For Americans)
“I made it clear he was an adversary, and I said he was worthy. I didn’t underestimate him,” Biden continued. “You heard the speech he made … as to why he was going into Ukraine. He has much larger ambitions than Ukraine. He wants to, in fact, reestablish the former Soviet Union. That’s what this is about.”
The president said Putin’s ambitions are “completely contrary” to the rest of the world’s current standing.
Doocy then asked whether the president was “confident” that the U.S. sanctions imposed on Russia Thursday would be “as devastating as Russian missiles and bullets and tanks.”
“Yes — Russian bullets, missiles and tanks in Ukraine — yes I am,” the president responded.
The new sanctions target four Russian banks, elites, and “corrupt billionaires,” and limit exports to the country. The first round of sanctions, imposed Tuesday, blocked two Russian banks and access to Western financing to assist their sovereign debt.
The president also issued an executive order Monday to prohibit investment, trade and financing from Americans in the separatist-controlled regions known as the so-called Donetsk and Luhansk People’s Republics.
