US President Joe Biden appeared to confuse the current French President Emmanuel Macron with his predecessor Francois Mitterrand, who died in 1996, during his speech on Monday (February 5). Biden was describing a meeting between himself and Macron in England during the G7 summit in June 2021.
A video of Joe Biden's speech has gone viral on social media, in which he can be heard saying, "It was in the south of England, and I sat down and I said, 'America's back.'" Biden recalled, "'And Mitterrand from Germany, I mean from France, looked at me and said, 'You know, how long you back for?'"
He further mentioned that Germany's Angela Merkel asked him how he would feel if he heard about the storming of Parliament in Britain. Biden said it was a new way of looking at the January 6 riot through fresh eyes. "I never thought about it from that perspective. What would we say if that happened in another democracy around the world?" said Biden. He further added, "It's not going to happen. This guy is going to lose."
Viral Video of Joe Biden:
Joe Biden's confusion between Mitterrand and Macron is embarrassing for an 81-year-old already battling to convince the American public that he retains his full mental faculties. Macron is the youngest president in French history and the youngest French head of state since Napoleon. Biden also met Mitterrand as a young senator. Mitterrand took office in 1981, when the current French president was three years old.
Biden, as chair of the European Affairs Committee, met Mitterrand in January 1988 while discussing a Soviet nuclear weapons treaty. Mitterrand was president until 1995 and died a year later, aged 79.