President Joe Biden gave a State of the Union address on Tuesday night with a warning to Russian President, Vladimir Putin that there would be sanctions on Russian billionaires’ “yachts, your luxury apartments, your private jets. We are coming for your ill-begotten gains.”
Biden said Putin miscalculated by attacking Ukraine and he met the resistance of the Ukrainian people.
He said, “Six days ago, Russia’s Vladimir Putin sought to shake the foundations of the free world, thinking he could make it bend to his menacing ways. But he badly miscalculated. He thought he could roll into Ukraine and the world would roll over. Instead he met a wall of strength he never imagined. He met the Ukrainian people.”
The President also boasted of the West’s unanimity in the face of Russia’s aggression, saying their united front is “inflicting pain on Russia and supporting the people of Ukraine” and “choking off Russia’s access to technology that will sap its economic strength and weaken its military for years to come.”
“Putin’s latest attack on Ukraine was premeditated and unprovoked. He rejected repeated, repeated, efforts at diplomacy. He thought the West and NATO wouldn’t respond. He thought he could divide us at home, in this chamber and in this nation. Putin was wrong. We were ready,” Biden said.
“We spent months building a coalition of other freedom-loving nations from Europe and the Americas to Asia and Africa to confront Putin. I spent countless hours unifying our European allies. We shared with the world in advance what we knew Putin was planning and precisely how he would try to falsely justify his aggression. We countered Russia’s lies with truth. And now that he has acted the free world is holding him accountable.
“We are joining with our European allies to find and seize your yachts, your luxury apartments, your private jets. We are coming for your ill-begotten gains,” he said.
He also asserted that “Russia’s economy is reeling and Putin alone is to blame.”
Putin, for his part, was not expected to watch the speech, according to Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov. “The President usually does not watch TV addresses,” Peskov said in response to a question from CNN.
As Tuesday unfolded ahead of Biden’s primetime speech, the President, his administration and its allies have made it clear that Ukraine has been top of mind.
The US and its allies announced early Tuesday that they had agreed to a release of 60 million barrels from their reserves, the White House and International Energy Agency, as leaders seek to dampen the effect of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine on gas prices at home.
Vice President Kamala Harris held five separate calls with European leaders and Biden held a half-hour call with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky.