Former President Donald Trump on Tuesday morning said President Joe Biden wouldn't have needed to threaten closure of the Nord Stream 2 pipeline if he had continued Trump administration policy.
Biden on Monday warned Russian President Vladimir Putin that the U.S. would "bring an end" to the Nord Stream 2 pipeline if Russian troops invade Ukraine.
"Well, I stopped it, but I stopped it differently," Trump said Tuesday during an interview on Fox Business. "I stopped it with the threat of tariffs and with various other things. And it was stopped. It was dead. It was absolutely dead.
"Biden came in and he opened it. And he killed our pipeline, Keystone XL. But I stopped it. I had it stopped … I didn't know what he was doing, he came in and he said, 'Proceed with that [Nord Stream] pipeline.' "
Biden spoke Monday while standing next to German Chancellor Olaf Scholz during a press conference at the White House.
Trump said Scholz heard Biden's "we will bring an end to it" words and gave the president a look that said, "What are you talking about?"
"Germany really is a hostage of Russia," Trump told host Maria Bartiromo on Fox Business. "There's no question about it."
U.S. officials have warned that the pipeline could make Germany overly reliant on Russia for energy.
"I really tried to convince [former Chancellor Angela Merkel] not to do the pipeline deal because, I said, that Germany would be absolutely a hostage, and that's what it is, a hostage of Russia," he told Fox Business.
"I actually jokingly gave her a white flag early on. I said, 'Here’s a white flag.' She said, 'What's that for?' I said, 'That's surrender because you surrender to Russia immediately when this [pipeline] deal is done.'"
Trump said the current Russia-Ukraine problem would not exist if he still were in office.
"There would be no Ukraine problem right now if we were there," Trump told Bartiromo. "If the Trump administration were in place, there would be no, absolutely no problem with any of this. You wouldn't have inflation, you wouldn't have rising taxes. You wouldn't have the problem with Ukraine. You wouldn't have the problem that you will have with Taiwan."
Trump also was asked about other issues, such as what investigations he would like to see if Republicans win control of the House in the midterm elections.
"Well, there are plenty of them to look at," he said. "You can certainly look at relationships between some of these politicians that do nothing, having to do with lots of different countries that we talk about.
"And you can certainly look at all of the political corruption on the other side where nothing happens."
Trump was asked, "Should Biden be impeached for unconstitutional mandates and/or accepting money from the Chinese?"
"They've taken in millions and millions of dollars into that family, nothing will happen," Trump told Bartiromo. "They only go after Republicans."
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