President Joe Biden’s National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan didn’t realize the microphone in front of him was on and slipped up.
Sullivan accidentally revealed that the United States government uses taxpayer money to maintain seized Russian yachts.
The slip-up occurred during an event at the Center for a New American Security on June 16, 2022.
While speaking with Richard Fontaine, chief executive officer of the CNAS, about the White House’s effort to seize Russian assets, he admitted taxpayers are fronting the bill.
The live stream event was uploaded to YouTube, but after the admission it was deleted.
“I just wasn’t aware how many super yachts there were in the world,” Fontaine tells Sullivan on the recording. “I mean the size of these things, the value of these things is unbelievable.”
“I know. It’s so ridiculous, but you know what the craziest thing is? When we seize one, we have to pay for the upkeep,” Sullivan said.
“The federal government pays for upkeep because under the kind of forfeiture rubric, so like some people are basically being paid to maintain Russian superyachts on behalf of the United States government,” he added.
It has been assumed that Sullivan was referencing the recent seizure of a 348-foot yacht, the Amadea that Russian oligarch Suleiman Kerimov owned. The US government sailed the vessel to the United States in June after Fiji’s supreme court authorized its seizure.
National security adviser Jake Sullivan spoke at a think tank this AM. He was caught on a hot mic talking Russian yachts.
“You know what the craziest thing is: When we seize one, we have to pay for upkeep. The federal government pays for upkeep, under the forfeiture rubric…”
— Jonathan Guyer (@mideastXmidwest) June 16, 2022
The audio was taken offline after Sullivan’s comments went viral. The think tank claimed the deletion of the admission was not done on purpose but was an “honest mistake.”
This is just another fine example of the incompetence of the Biden administration.
Apparently, nobody in the Biden administration thinks things through before doing them.
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June 21, 2022
