Immediately after Iowa Gov. Kim Reynolds gave the GOP response to President Biden’s Tuesday night State of the Union address, CNN chief political correspondent Dana Bash defended Biden from attacks from Reynolds on his Russia record.
Anchor Jake Tapper described Reynolds’s response as “harsh,” and summarized her argument:
One item she had to say about the items leading up to the run in, run-up rather of Putin's invasion she said waiving sanctions on Russian pipelines while limiting oil production at home. That's a reference to the fact that there was a big effort in the Congress and bipartisan supported, to sanction the Nord Stream 2, a natural gas pipeline from Russia to Germany, which Biden and the White House pushed back on because they felt like that would alienate Germany, a key ally in NATO, ultimately everybody got to where, Ted Cruz was even happy, but it took a long time and, yeah. It was more important to the Biden administration to have Germany onboard with their coalition than to—to-- impose the sanctions at that point.
Tapper forgot to mention that bipartisan support evaporated due to White House pressure as Democrats hypocritically filibustered sanctions on Nord Stream II, but that paled in comparison to Bash’s take on the matter. She claimed that Biden was correct to waive sanctions. “And if you look at what has happened over the past week, that strategy from the Biden Administration was right,” she proclaimed.
Bash claimed that allowing the pipeline to proceed, which gave Putin leverage of Germany and probably led him to believe Berlin would not do a 180, was actually critical for alliance unity:
The Biden administration said, we're not going to do it and it's because they were trying to make sure that the European allies and the U.S. were in lockstep. And by waiting, they actually made that happen. Because the EU, the NATO allies, everybody came together in a much more intense, aggressive way with these economic sanctions than ever--anybody ever imagined.
Nord Stream II should’ve been sanctioned before as a matter of prudence, regardless of larger Russian ambitions in Ukraine and the only reason why sanctions are stronger than Bash imagined is that Germany has done a complete reversal after appeasing Putin for years, something Biden helped it do by waiving sanctions.
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Here is a transcript for the March 1 coverage:
CNN SOTU Coverage
3/1/2022
10:48 AM ETJAKE TAPPER: Republican governor of Iowa, Kim Reynolds, with a harsh critique of President Biden and his speech. She, too, Dana, like—like-- President Biden, started off talking about foreign policy and then quickly pivoted to a speech largely focused on domestic policy. One item she had to say about the items leading up to the run in, run-up rather of Putin's invasion she said waiving sanctions on Russian pipelines while limiting oil production at home. That's a reference to the fact that there was a big effort in the Congress and bipartisan supported, to sanction the Nord Stream 2, a natural gas pipeline from Russia to Germany, which Biden and the White House pushed back on because they felt like that would alienate Germany, a key ally in NATO, ultimately everybody got to where, Ted Cruz was even happy, but it took a long time and, yeah. It was more important to the Biden administration to have Germany onboard with their coalition than to—to-- impose the sanctions at that point.
DANA BASH: And if you look at what has happened over the past week, that strategy from the Biden Administration was right because had the Biden administration listened to -- mostly Republicans but some Democrats on Capitol Hill saying be more aggressive first and foremost about Nord Stream 2 about the pipeline that was, is built from Russia to give natural gas to Germany, but also even more broadly so many voices on the Republican side—TAPPER: There were Democrats too,
BASH: -- but even the chairman of the Foreign Relations Committee saying we have to be more robust in sanctioning. The Biden administration said, we're not going to do it and it's because they were trying to make sure that the European allies and the U.S. were in lock step. And by waiting, they actually made that happen. Because the EU, the NATO allies, everybody came together in a much more intense, aggressive way with these economic sanctions than ever--anybody ever imagined.
