President Biden met with Alexei Navalny’s wife and daughter in California on Thursday. He promised Navalny's wife Yulia Navalnaya, and their daughter, Dasha, that the United States will announce sanctions Friday.

Biden has been yammering about the sanctions to be announced today all week. He doesn't even make it sound as though he will be making the announcement. Perhaps it will come from the State Department or the Treasury Department. I wouldn't blame Biden's handlers for telling others to announce the sanctions, given what a mess Biden makes of his remarks on the regular. 

One worry I have is that the new measures are timed to mark the second anniversary of Russia's full-scale invasion of Ukraine. Remember when Biden timed the disastrous withdrawal from Afghanistan to happen on September 11 for historical reference? Let's hope this goes better. Biden is all about symbolism and little else.

Navalnaya was in California to visit her daughter, a student at Stanford University. She tweeted out a photo of the two of them.

Милая моя девочка. Я же прилетела тебя обнять и поддержать, а ты сидишь и поддерживаешь меня.
Такая сильная, смелая и стойкая. Мы обязательно со всем справимся, родная. Как хорошо, что ты рядом. Люблю. pic.twitter.com/FzDbrykUjH

— Yulia Navalnaya (@yulia_navalnaya) February 22, 2024

The secret meeting was not on Biden's official White House schedule. It was not previously reported. Remember when Biden pledged to have the most transparent administration ever? Good times, good times.

The White House released a statement that claims the sanctions will be "major" in response to Navalny's death. 

"The President expressed his admiration for Aleksey Navalny’s extraordinary courage and his legacy of fighting against corruption and for a free and democratic Russia in which the rule of law applies equally to everyone," the White House readout said. Biden, it said, emphasized that Navalny's "legacy will carry on through people across Russia and around the world mourning his loss and fighting for freedom, democracy, and human rights."

Today, I met with Yulia and Dasha Navalnaya – Aleksey Navalny's loved ones – to express my condolences for their devastating loss.

Aleksey's legacy of courage will live on in Yulia and Dasha, and the countless people across Russia fighting for democracy and human rights. pic.twitter.com/aiCcgTrws3

— President Biden (@POTUS) February 22, 2024

See, he's President Empathy when it suits his re-election campaign. Does that sound cynical? It's true. Why did he wait a year to visit East Palestine, Ohio, and then show up with the press and insist he is doing what he can for the residents? 

Navalnaya is taking over her late husband's fight for a "free Russia." She was in attendance at the Munich Security Conference when her husband's death was announced. She bravely addressed the audience.

She met with the European Union foreign ministers in Brussels on Monday. She told them that Russian authorities were waiting for traces of Novichok to leave his body. It's a reasonable conclusion since Putin used the nerve agent on her husband in 2020. 

Biden referred to Putin as a "crazy SOB" during a fundraiser in San Francisco on Thursday. Sure, he's a dangerous man but the last existential threat is ... climate. Yep, even while addressing the murder of a Putin dissident, Biden works in his ridiculous rhetoric on climate. He has no idea what he is saying but it's what the progressive wing of his party wants him to talk about. Sure, there's always a nuclear threat, but climate.

It will be interesting to hear what sanctions are announced against Russia. Under Secretary of State Victoria Nuland said some of the "hundreds and hundreds and hundreds" of sanctions will be announced so I assume we won't be given the full picture. She said the sanctions will target those responsible for Navalny's death. They will also be against "Putin's war machine" and close gaps in existing sanctions. Why wasn't all this done sooner? Why wasn't it done when Putin invaded Ukraine, or when Putin's thugs rounded up American citizens on trumped-up charges? Will anyone in the press bother to ask? Nah. It's an election year and their guy is up for re-election.