Jake Tapper Confronts Psaki Over Biden-Putin Meeting: Why ‘Reward’ Him With a Summit?

CNN’s Jake Tapper questioned White House press secretary Jen Psaki on why President Joe Biden would “reward” Vladimir Putin with a summit right now.

Tapper brought up recent cyberattacks that have been linked to Russia, the two Americans — Trevor Reed and Paul Whelan — currently in jail in Russia, and the case of Alexei Navalny.

“Why reward Putin with a summit with the President of the United States?” Tapper asked. “Is there really hope that there’s anything that can be accomplished with this man using diplomacy?”

Psaki said they’re not viewing it as a “reward,” but as “a meeting that’s in the interests of the United States.”

“All of those issues you raised, all of these challenging components, how adversarial the relationship has been, that’s not in our interest and we want to find a way forward,” she added.

Tapper continued pressing on why the meeting is happening, asking, “Putin and people in Putin’s Russia are attacking the United States right now in the cyber arena. Your Energy Secretary told me just Sunday that these hackers could right now shut down the power grid in the United States. Do you think that Putin understands words more than he understands, say, a counterattack?”

Psaki responded by saying they’ve “never taken” counteraction off the table and said Biden “has every intention” to raise human rights abuses and “the jailing of dissidents and activists.”

You can watch above, via CNN.