Claire Trevett: NZ Herald Political Editor on Joe Biden's mental capacity and the NATO summit

Joe Biden's mental capacity hasn't been a consideration for Christopher Luxon in his meeting with the US President. 

He's had a chance to discuss Indo-Pacific issues with Biden at the NATO summit in Washington DC. 

The Prime Minister says Biden was sharp and "on top of his brief". 

He says Biden wanted to discuss US engagement in the Indo-Pacific region, and their interactions were positive and very engaging. 

NZ Herald Political Editor Claire Trevett told Ryan Bridge that NATO leaders are nervous to comment on Biden’s mental state as Trump is less friendly towards the organisation. 

She suspects things will get a bit messy once NATO is finished and Bien is no longer being made a fool of in front of world leaders. 

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
Christopher Luxen has met with the US President Joe Biden.
This is a new meeting at the White House. There
was the dinner last night, now a new meeting as
the NATO summit ramps up. It's been a busy day
for the PM meeting with the Indo Pacific leaders before
heading to the North to the North Atlantic Council meeting
as well as bilateral meetings. He's got later this morning.

(00:21):
Joining me now is the New Zealand Herald political editor
Claire Trevette. Claire. Let's talk about that new meeting between
Luxon and Biden.

Speaker 2 (00:29):
Yes, it's just happened here now. They've sent a photo
of the two of them together. It seems that they've
had something of a short chat before the next summit
meeting that's happening here. We're not sure of the contents
of that. We'll talk to Christopher Luxon in another couple
of hours and hopefully get a bit more out of it.
But they have had what seems to be a more

(00:50):
falsome catch up. He hasn't yet had a proper chat
with US President Joe Biden, but then at the dinner
last night, I think they'd had a handshake as they
came many kind of things, so he'll be pretty stoked
if he's had a better chat than that. It made him.
I think it made him a bit late for the
next summit, but it's probably worth it, so we'll find
out the full context of that chat a bit later.

Speaker 1 (01:12):
He's obviously not going into Biden's mental capacity, et cetera
for good reason. Have you seen Biden since you've been there,
have you seen him speak? Do you have any comment
on his mental acuity?

Speaker 2 (01:26):
Well, the most interesting thing over here is the all
of them are being asked about Biden, and the NATO
leaders are a bit nervous about it because Donald Trump's
less friendly towards NATO than Joe Biden is. You've had
George Clooney coming out. He dropped a real clanger of
an ophead and the worst thing he said was that

(01:47):
the Democratic Party leaders have to stop trying to fall
kind of one hundred and fifty five million people that
they didn't see what they know, what they thought they
had seen. And I've seen Biden, not in the flesh,
but I have watched him deliver the main speeches of
the NATO function. It's hard to tell with those because

(02:08):
they're Autoques basically, so he's more or less just reading
them out. But I mean he is you know, he's
not a young man, so we'll leave it to them.
But I think Nancy Pelosi came out in the end
and still the Democrats to stop talking about it until
at least after the NATO so much has ended, so
I suspect things to get a bit messy here once

(02:30):
NATO was finished and Joe Biden's no longer being made
a fool of in front of all these world leaders.
That's pretty much. It's pretty much conversation. But it's just
kind of if we were like there will be all
of them are being asked about Biden. Even in that
Indo Pacific Foe meeting, we weren't allowed to ask any questions,

(02:54):
but of course, you know, if someone inevitably does. And
one of the Australian journalists yelled out to Zelenski, asked
him whether he thought Joe Biden should step down as
the as the candidate. So that's the only question that
got yelled out, And you.

Speaker 1 (03:08):
Can always you can always expect that from an Aussie,
you know that just ruthless. Hey, hey, this presser where
it could all come undone. So this is Biden going
on his own to a pressa after NATO. It's going
to be nine to thirty New Zealand time, so just
after we are off here, it'll be during Carrey's show
here on Newstalks. He b but do you get to
go to that?

Speaker 2 (03:29):
I actually think we may have to be on our
way to the airport, so we're kind of hoping we will.
But everything's running a bit late here as well, so
it could get it could get crunched out, but we're
not sure. One other conflicting thing is that, you know,
christ Luckson's been trying to get a meeting with Ted
Cruz the whole time he's been here, and it's been
delayed twice. One last chance this morning, just before he

(03:51):
goes to the plane. So right, so yeah, I'm not
sure whether whether or not we'll get to say that.
We're hoping to clear.

Speaker 1 (03:58):
Thank you very much for that. That's Trevette, who is
The New Zealand Herald's political editor with us live from Washington,
DC this morning. So for more from News Talks B
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