President Joe Biden blamed Russian President Vladimir Putin on Friday for the death of opposition leader Alexei Navalny in a remote Arctic prison.
Navalny, a frequent critic of Russian President Vladimir Putin, was in prison after being convicted on charges of “extremism” and sentenced to 19 years in prison. Russia’s Federal Penitentiary Service said that Navalny felt sick after going on a walk and soon after lost consciousness and died.
During a brief press conference from the White House, Biden said that Navalny “bravely stood up to the corruption, the violence, and all the bad things that Putin was doing.”
“In response, Putin had him poisoned. He had him arrested. He had him prosecuted for fabricated crimes. He sends him to prison. He was held in isolation. Even all that didn’t stop him from calling out Putin’s lies,” Biden said. “Even in prison, he was a powerful voice for the truth, which is kind of amazing when you think about it. And he could have lived safely in exile after the assassination attempt on him in 2020, which nearly killed him I might add … instead, he returned to Russia.”
“Russian authorities are going to tell their own story. But make no mistake, make no mistake, Putin is responsible for Navalny’s death. Putin is responsible,” Biden continued. “What has happened to Navalny is yet more proof of Putin’s brutality. No one should be fooled — not in Russia, not at home, not anywhere in the world — Putin does not only target citizens of other countries … He also inflicts terrible crimes of his own people.”
Biden then used Navalny’s death to make political attacks against Republicans, demanding that the House of Representatives pass his foreign aid bill to fund Ukraine.
CLICK HERE TO GET THE DAILYWIRE+ APP
The 81-year-old president also attacked former President Donald Trump over his recent remarks about NATO and Russia, saying that everyone “should reject the dangerous statements by the previous president that invited Russia to invade our NATO allies if they weren’t paying up.”
Navalny had been sentenced to prison in 2021 after returning to Moscow from Germany, where he was undergoing treatment for poisoning from a nerve agent that was blamed on the Kremlin. The Kremlin has denied any responsibility for his poisoning, but United States intelligence officials have said they believe Russia was responsible.
Navalny frequently faced criminal charges during his career in Russian politics, which he said were motivated because of his opposition to Putin. Navalny founded the Anti-Corruption Foundation, which was dissolved in Russia in 2021, to expose corruption by high-ranking Russian officials and challenge the United Russia Party’s control over the country’s political system.
Leif Le Mahieu contributed to this report.