President Joe Biden grinned and stayed tight-lipped as reporters asked him Friday about what he was telling world leaders about the incoming Trump administration.
Biden is in Lima, Peru for the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation Forum and held a trilateral meeting with South Korean President Yoon Suk Yeol and Japanese Prime Minister Shigeru Ishiba.
After that, he met with Peruvian President Dina Boluarte.
In both cases, at the end of the leaders’ remarks, journalists asked Biden Trump-themed questions and he didn’t respond.
Instead he sat in his chair and smiled as the press was escorted out.
Two senior administration officials also swore that Trump didn’t come up in any of Biden’s meetings on Friday.
An official who briefed reporters on the Japan and South Korea meeting said: ‘No, as a matter of fact the president-elect’s name did not come up.’
SMILING BIDENS: President Joe Biden grinned and kept his mouth shut Friday as he was peppered with questions about what a Trump presidency meant for U.S. allies – many of whom are attending the APEC summit in Lima, Peru
That official explained that most of the meeting between the U.S., Japan and South Korea was dedicated to the worrying alliance between Russia and North Korea.
During Trump’s four years in office he appeared to be breaking through to North Korean Leader Kim Jong Un, boasting about ‘love letters’ sent between the two after they met face-to-face in Singapore in 2018.
However their bromance never helped forge a true nuclear deal – and the relationship with North Korea has frayed even further once Biden came into power.
The official also said that Trump didn’t even come up in the context of the incoming president’s relationship with Kim.
The White House sang a similar tune when asked about Biden’s meeting with Boluarte – where he was joined with a number of members of his senior staff.
‘No it really focused on the current U.S. bilateral relationship,’ the official said.
‘President Biden did underscore the importance of respect for democracy and – and strengthening democratic institutions, as he does in all of his meetings with democratic counterparts around the world,’ the source continued. ‘But it was, it was a meeting that was very much focused on the, frankly, the accomplishments that the Biden administration has had with Peru over the past four years.’
Biden has not taken questions from the press since before Vice President Kamala Harris’ election loss to Trump on November 5.
He did suggest during an Oval Office spray that he wished to see a reporter get whacked in the head with a television camera.
She had asked if he believed he would be able to get a ceasefire in Gaza accomplished before Trump takes over on January 20.
