President Vladimir V. Putin said on Wednesday that it was in Russia’s interest for President Biden to win a second term, calling his American counterpart experienced and predictable and dismissing concerns about Mr. Biden’s age.
It was the first time Mr Putin had directly expressed a preference ahead of the US presidential election in November, and the comments ran counter to the widespread assumption that the Kremlin had its roots in former President Donald J. Trump, the front-runner is the Republican candidate. Mr Putin made the comments in a brief interview on Russian state television that aired late on Wednesday.
“Who is better for us: Biden or Trump?” asked the interviewer.
“Maiden,” Mr. Putin replied. “He’s a more experienced person, he’s predictable, he’s an old-school politician.”
Mr Putin added with a smile: “But we will work with any US leader that the American people trust.”
Some commentators were quick to dismiss Mr. Putin’s comments as a provocation or perhaps a roundabout attempt to cost Mr. Biden’s campaign by imposing on him the support of one of America’s main rivals.
It was also the latest in a series of comments by Mr. Putin that appeared aimed at keeping tensions with the United States in check, coming at a time when other developments — such as concerns about Russia’s possible plans to develop a space nuclear weapon — threaten to exacerbate tensions in the countries’ relations.
Mr Trump stunned policymakers last week when he said he would invite Russia to “do whatever the hell they want” to NATO member countries that had not met their military spending commitments.
Referring to Mr Trump’s comments, Mr Putin said in the interview on Wednesday: “Let them figure it out themselves – that’s their problem.”
“I think NATO doesn’t make sense anymore, it doesn’t make sense,” Mr Putin added. “It has only one purpose – as an instrument of US foreign policy.”
Asked later about Mr Biden’s health, Mr Putin defended his American counterpart – even as Russian state media often echoed Republicans disparaging Mr Biden as too old for the job. When he met Mr Biden in Switzerland in 2021, Mr Putin said, “they were already saying he was incompetent. I haven’t seen anything like it.”
The comment was Mr Putin’s latest on US policy which appeared, at least on the surface, to hold out an olive branch to the Biden administration. In an interview last week with Tucker Carlson, a former Fox News anchor, Mr. Putin avoided directly criticizing Mr. Biden and said little about Mr. Trump while calling on Washington to negotiate on Ukraine — a proposal which was quickly rejected by the White House. .
(In Wednesday’s comments, Mr. Putin also took a dig at Mr. Carlson, describing his surprise that Mr. Carlson was “patiently listening to my lengthy dialogues” and that he hadn’t asked “tough questions.”)
Even some of Mr. Putin’s supporters, however, questioned whether the Russian leader was sincere in his praise of Mr. Biden. A post by a pro-Kremlin blogger called the interview a “fantasy late-night trolling session” that may have been intended to benefit Mr. Trump, given that backing Putin is not necessarily beneficial in American politics.
Indeed, Mr Trump said at a campaign event on Wednesday that Mr Putin had paid him a “compliment”.
“Of course he would say that,” Mr Trump said. “He wants to have Biden because he will be given everything.”
When he was president, Mr. Trump was heavily criticized by Democrats for being overly cautious about Russia and Mr. Putin. That was especially true after the 2018 summit in Helsinki, where Mr Trump chose to back Mr Putin over America’s own intelligence services, before trying to back down.
Russia intervened before the 2016 election to help Mr Trump, the US intelligence community has concluded, with Mr Putin publicly calling Mr Trump “a very brilliant and talented man”. But in the aftermath, there was widespread frustration in Moscow that Mr Trump did not live up to his campaign rhetoric about improving relations with Russia.
Asked about Mr Trump in September, Mr Putin said: “I think there will be no fundamental changes in the Russian direction of US foreign policy, regardless of who is elected president.”
Oleg Matsnev contributed to the report.
