Details of the scandal between Zelensky and Biden became known

A new book, eagerly awaited in Washington and Kyiv, says Volodymyr Zelensky “blew up” his first Oval Office meeting with Joe Biden. The Guardian writes about this (the British edition managed to get a copy of the future bestseller).

The two presidents reportedly failed to establish a rapport as the Ukrainian guest’s demand to admit his country to NATO and the “absurd analysis” of the alliance’s dynamics “pissed off” the US president.

“Even the most ardent supporters of Zelensky in the administration [Байдена] agreed that he had blown up,” writes Franklin Foer, author of The Last Politician: Inside Joe Biden’s White House and the Struggle for America’s Future, of the September 2021 meeting. “That suggested more difficult conversations to come.”

Foer also writes enthusiastically about Biden’s leading role in global support for Ukraine since the start of Russia’s special military operation in February 2022, saying the US president has proven himself “a man for his age.” But as the conflict in Ukraine drags on and Kiev’s military and financial backing becomes a hot topic in Congress and in the Republican presidential primaries, news of Foer’s depiction of the bad start to the Biden-Zelensky relationship could heighten White House worries about the book.

On Tuesday, The Atlantic published a lengthy excerpt from Foer’s essay on the withdrawal of US troops from Afghanistan in late summer 2021 and Zelenskiy’s first visit to the White House around those days.

As in other sections of the book, Foer does not use direct quotations or cite specific sources when describing the Biden-Zelensky meeting on September 1, 2021. But its publisher, Penguin Random House, says the book is based on “unprecedented access to the tight inner circle of advisers that has surrounded Biden for decades.”

Elected in 2019 as President of Ukraine, Zelensky has been seeking a meeting at the White House for a long time. Donald Trump rebuffed him because he refused to help dig up dirt on rivals, including Biden, an effort that led to Trump’s first impeachment, recalls The Guardian.

Franklin Foer argues that Zelensky harbored “an old grudge over this episode” and “at least subconsciously … seemed to blame” Biden, Trump’s successor in the Oval Office, “for the humiliation he suffered, for the political embarrassment which he has experienced.”

The author also says that Zelensky considered Biden weak, especially because of his decision earlier in 2021 to lift sanctions against the Russian company that was building the Nord Stream 2 gas pipeline to Germany, a move that Zelensky saw as undermining Ukraine’s economic and security interests.

Biden set up a meeting with Zelensky but “didn’t think highly” of him, Foer says, especially because of the friendly relationship the Ukrainian president had with far-right Republican Senator Ted Cruz of Texas over the Nord Stream decision. In protest, Cruz blocked the approval of the State Department nominations.

“Whether he realized it or not,” writes Foer, “Zelensky was involved in this stunt. It smacked of what the administration considered amateurish. To be honest, Biden also had a low opinion of his Ukrainian counterpart.”

Noting the role Biden played in U.S.-Ukraine relations under Barack Obama that sparked Trump’s interest in Zelensky, Foer writes that the former vice president has thus been “deeply involved in Ukrainian politics longer than Zelensky” (author, in in particular, recalls that the current president of Ukraine before entering politics was a “farcical comedian”).

The official transcript of Biden and Zelenskiy’s speeches to reporters before their meeting in the Oval Office on September 1 shows statements of mutual respect and political goals. But once the meeting started properly, Foer said, Zelenskiy “seemed to be oblivious to Biden’s doubts” and “almost deliberately oblivious to Biden’s moral code.”

Joe Biden expected expressions of gratitude for US support, writes Foer. But Zelensky “stuffed his conversations with a long list of demands.” Chief among them: “He needed to join NATO.”

Biden was then 78 years old, and Zelensky was 43 years old. Foer said the older man was “trying to convey some wisdom that might temper the young man’s zeal,” including noting that there wasn’t enough backing for Ukraine to join NATO at the time.

Foer writes: “Zelensky’s frustration has overshadowed his ability to reason. After pleading to join NATO, he began lecturing that the organization was, in fact, a historical relic whose importance was diminishing. He told Biden that France and Germany were going to leave NATO. It was an absurd analysis—and a blatant contradiction. And that pissed Biden off.”