Trump shakes Saudi Crown Prince’s hand, criticizes Biden’s fist bump
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President Donald Trump gave Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman a warm welcome at the White House on Tuesday, shaking his hand, unlike former President Joe Biden, who came under scrutiny for punching the Saudi prince in 2022.
Biden’s jab occurred during a visit to Saudi Arabia in July 2022 and has come under criticism over US intelligence reports indicating that Bin Salman orchestrated the assassination of Washington Post journalist Jamal Khashoggi in 2018.
But when bin Salman arrived at the White House on Tuesday, Trump said the Saudi prince deserved a more formal greeting.
“And Trump isn’t pulling any punches. I’m holding that hand,” Trump told reporters on Tuesday. “I don’t care where that hand is, I’m holding that hand. Do you remember Biden? He travels 20 hours, goes out and punches. No. When you get off the plane and face the man who is the future king and one of the most respected people in the world, you shake his hand, you don’t punch him, right?”
President Donald Trump (R) meets with Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman in the Oval Office at the White House in Washington, November 18, 2025. (Nathan Howard/Politico/Bloomberg via Getty Images)
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“We don’t want to ask you that,” Trump said, referring to Bin Salman. “But I can’t imagine you getting excited.”
The Saudi leader’s arrival on Tuesday was a spectacle. A red carpet along the South Lawn, a military honor guard and an Air Force flyover highlighted the official state welcome.
Biden’s first encounter with bin Salman in 2022 occurred as he got out of a vehicle in front of the Al Salam Royal Palace in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia. Biden later dodged reporters’ questions about the interaction but told them he had suggested to Bin Salman that he believed the Crown Prince was “responsible” for Khashoggi’s death.
This shift led former Washington Post publisher Fred Ryan to describe the gesture as more offensive than shaking hands.
People hold posters of murdered Saudi journalist Jamal Khashoggi near the Saudi Arabian consulate in Istanbul on October 2, 2020, to mark the second anniversary of his death. (Emrah Gürel, File/The Associated Press)
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“The fist bump between President Biden and Mohammed bin Salman was worse than a handshake; it was disgraceful,” Ryan said in a statement. “This envisaged a level of closeness and comfort that would provide MBS with the misplaced salvation he so desperately sought.”
More than a year later, in September 2023, Biden shook hands with Bin Salman when they met in person at the G20 global economic summit in New Delhi.
US intelligence agencies concluded that Bin Salman gave the green light to the operation that cost Khashoggi’s life in 2021. Saudi dissident Khashoggi was brutally murdered in the Saudi consulate in Istanbul in 2018.
Saudi journalist Jamal Khashoggi was killed in 2018. (Hasan Jamali, File/The Associated Press)
Yet Bin Salman denied the accuracy of these reports. Asked about Khashoggi on Tuesday, bin Salman said it was “painful” to hear that anyone had died “without any real purpose” and added: “We are doing our best to prevent this from happening again.”
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Trump also came to the defense of Bin Salman on Tuesday, accusing him of embarrassing a reporter who asked about U.S. intelligence reports linking the prince to Khashoggi’s death.
“A lot of people didn’t like the gentleman you mentioned,” Trump said Tuesday. “Whether you like him or not, things happen, but he didn’t know anything about it. So would you leave it like that? There’s no need to embarrass our guest by asking questions.”
Fox News Digital has reached out to Biden’s office for comment but has not yet received a response.
