Trudeau's Candid Comments Used In Joe Biden's Attack Ad Against Trump

TORONTO — Candid comments made by Prime Minister Justin Trudeau poking fun at the U.S. president feature prominently in a new sizzle reel released by Joe Biden.

The ad was posted online Wednesday by the former vice president’s 2020 presidential campaign. It shows footage of Trudeau talking with other world leaders and British royalty during a reception at Buckingham Palace on the heels of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) summit in London this week. Trudeau was heard discussing President Donald Trump’s lengthy press conference the day before.

Watch: Trudeau explains Trump comments. Story continues below video.

“You just watch his team’s jaws drop to the floor,” the prime minister is heard saying in the video, a remark Trudeau later said was about Trump’s announcement the next G7 will be held at Camp David . French President Emmanuel Macron, Dutch Prime Minister Mark Rutte, and British Prime Minister Boris Johnson were huddled around Trudeau, as well as Princess Anne. 

The video, which was spotted by CBC News’ Chris Rands after reviewing pool television coverage of the event, leads Biden’s attack ad against Trump, in which he says the world is laughing at the president.

“The world sees Trump for what he is: insincere, ill-informed, corrupt,” says Biden in the ad, calling Trump “dangerously incompetent and incapable, in my view, of world leadership.”

Speaking to reporters in London Wednesday, Trudeau did not apologize for the comments. Instead, the prime minister said he had “a number of good conversations with the president over the course of this day and yesterday.”

Trump later called Trudeau “two-faced” when asked about the remarks. He also called the prime minister a “very nice guy.” In a bizarre twist of fate, The Hill reported that Trump said “that was funny when I said that guy was two-faced ” into a hot mic after the press conference.

 The president’s son, Donald Trump Jr., rushed to support his dad’s “two-faced” burn with a tweet of a photo of Trudeau wearing an Aladdin-inspired genie costume and brownface makeup at a costume party in 2001. Time Magazine released the photo during the election. Trudeau later apologized, calling his decision to wear the get-up “dumb.”

Despite exposure of candid comments made by the two world leaders, the leaders left the NATO summit on relatively amicable terms compared to the ending of the G7 summit last year when Trump made a swipe at Trudeau, calling him “meek and mild .” 

Earlier in the week, Trudeau and Trump met for a bilateral meeting. The two leaders talked about the new North American Free Trade Agreement agreement yet to be ratified by both countries. On defence spending, Trump labelled Canada as “just slightly delinquent .”

NATO figures released last week suggest Canada is on track to maintain defence contributions at 1.31 per cent for the second year in a row. 

The number is below the two per cent standard that the 29 countries in the NATO alliance agreed to hit five years ago.