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Biden stages walkout of meeting after Australian PM recalls interactions with NRA

May 26, 2022 | | Print Article

President Joe Biden attended the Quad Leaders’ Summit in Tokyo on Tuesday and, during a sitdown with freshly-elected Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese, pretended to walk out on the leader.

The supposedly humorous moment occurred as Albanese recounted previous interactions with the United States government, specifically a time over three decades ago when he met with lobbying groups like the Sierra Club, Planned Parenthood, and the National Rifle Association.

At the mention of the gun-rights group, Biden stood up and made it look as if he was walking out of the meeting. The prime minister and others laughed at the president’s antics.

Albanese remembered coming to the U.S. as a State Department guest.

“You could design a theme [for the program], and mine was — I wanted to see the interaction of groups with the US government,” he noted. “So I did everything from the National Rifle Association to the Sierra Club to Planned Parenthood to the full — the full kit​ and​ caboodle across the spectrum​.”

As he approached the end of his list, Biden stood up and made it appear as though he was going to walk out of the meeting, while those in attendance chuckled. He turned around, however, and claimed that Albanese was “brave” to meet with the NRA over thirty years ago.

“You’re a brave man,” Biden chirped. “The Sierra Club and the National Rifle …”

​”But it was an — an opportunity to see the — the full diversity of the way that the country operates,” reported Albanese, adding, “the US State Department was good enough as well to manage to justify a trip to Vegas as well.”

Some on social media thought the stunt was strange, especially given that this occurred on the same day as the Robb Elementary School shooting in Uvalde, Texas that claimed the lives of 19 students and two teachers, as of this reporting.

Others mentioned that Albanese seems like Australia’s answer to President Biden:

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