- GOP Sen. Jim Risch says he wishes Biden "would stay on script" following his speech in Poland.
- President Biden on Saturday said Putin "cannot remain in power," but the White House walked it back.
- Officials have since clarified that the US does not have a strategy for regime change in Russia.
GOP Sen. Jim Risch on Sunday criticized President Joe Biden, saying he wishes that the president would "stay on script" after a fiery speech the president gave over the weekend in Poland about Russian President Vladimir Putin.
"I wish he would just stay on script. Whoever wrote that speech did a good job for him, but my gosh, I wish they would keep him on script," the Idaho lawmaker said during an interview with CNN's "State of the Union."
At the end of his speech from the Royal Castle in Warsaw, Poland, Biden said Putin "cannot remain in power," a comment that the White House immediately walked back.
"For God's sake, this man cannot remain in power," Biden said.
Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov responded to Biden's remarks saying that it's not on the US "to decide who will remain in power in Russia," The Associated Press reported.
Also, on Sunday, Secretary of State Antony Blinken clarified that the US does not "have a strategy of regime change in Russia."
Risch, who is the ranking member of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, during his CNN interview called the remark a "horrendous gaffe." He said Biden's remarks have the potential to escalate an already contentious diplomatic dilemma as Western allies aid Ukraine's defense against Russia but resist getting directly involved in the war.
"I think most people who don't deal in the lane of foreign relations don't realize that those nine words that he uttered would cause the kind of eruption that they did. But anytime you say, or even as he did suggest, that the policy was regime change, it's going to cause a huge problem," Risch continued. "This administration has done everything they can to stop escalating. There is not a whole lot more you can do to escalate than to call for regime change."
He added, "Please, Mr.President, stay on script."