In the wake of President Joe Biden’s disastrous debate performance Thursday night, Democrats are panicking. Just weeks ago, though, th...
In the wake of President Joe Biden’s disastrous debate performance Thursday night, Democrats are panicking.
Just weeks ago, though, they were assuring us the president was just fine, asking us in the spirit of the Marx Brothers, “Well, who are you gonna believe? Me or your own eyes?”
Here are some of the Biden allies who defended the president’s mental capacity against “right-wing propaganda” as recently as this month.
1. Nancy Pelosi
Just this month, former House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) slammed The Wall Street Journal for reporting on Democrats who said that behind closed doors, Biden is showing signs of mental slipping.
Pelosi posted on social media that many Democrats talked to the Journal and shared their “first-hand experiences” with Biden where they see “his wisdom, experience, strength and strategic thinking.”
“Instead, the Journal ignored testimony by Democrats, focused on attacks by Republicans and printed a hit piece,” Pelosi said.
2. Chuck Schumer
In February, Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-NY) defended Biden against a special counsel’s report saying the president has a “poor memory.”
“I talk to President Biden regularly. Usually several times in a week. His mental acuity is great, it’s fine, it’s as good as it’s been over the years,” Schumer told reporters.
“I’ve been speaking to him for 30 years since we worked on the Brady Bill, the assault weapons ban when I was a young congressman,” Schumer said. “He’s fine. All this right-wing propaganda that his mental acuity has declined is wrong.”
3. Biden Campaign Co-Chair Mitch Landrieu
In February, Mitch Landrieu, co-chairman of Biden’s reelection campaign, said that suggestions the president is mentally unfit for office are a “bucket of BS.”
“I’m telling you this guy’s tough, he’s smart, he’s on his game,” Landrieu said on MSNBC. “When you’re going to brief the president, you’d better have your big boy pants on. And this kind of sense that he’s not ready for this job is just a bucket of BS that’s so deep your boots will get stuck in it.”
4. Minnesota Governor Tim Walz
In January, Minnesota Governor Tim Walz (D) accused those criticizing Biden’s mental capacity of “ageism.”
“I’ve spent a lot of time with the president, and he’s great,” Walz said on NBC. “We’re talking, we’re chatting and all this, and I think, you know, we all get a little older, that’s what happens. But you also gain that insight, I think, when it comes to these issues, working across the aisle to get things done. You see the president just doing this with dignity, doing it with class, getting up every day, doing the work. So I think he’s just doing what he does.”
“Look, my mom’s 88, still living on the farm, drives herself,” Walz added. “Folks are able to do this. So I think there’s a little bit of ageism that goes to this. If it’s not that, it would be something else. They attack all of us on something. This is part of it.”
5. Senator Alex Padilla
Senator Alex Padilla (D-CA) said in February that Democrats’ task until November is to “remind” the American public that not only is Biden “fit to do the job, he’s doing a hell of a damn job.”
“If he was weak, he wouldn’t have been able to rally our allies to support Ukraine against Putin’s aggression,” Padilla said on MSNBC. “He wouldn’t have driven the economy to such great success.”
6. Montana Senator Jon Tester
Again in February, Senator Jon Tester (D-MT) said Biden has been “absolutely, 100% with it” when Tester has been around him.
“His recall, his cognitive ability, whatever you want to call it — I’m not a doctor, I’m a dirt farmer — he’s fine, and he’s doing a good job,” Tester told NBC. “I think folks are making a bigger deal out of it than it is.”
7. Congressman Dan Goldman
In February, Representative Dan Goldman (D-NY) went as far as to say that Biden is “sharper” than anyone he has spoken to about the Hamas attack on Israel.
“I was in Israel on October 7 as you know, and President Biden was nice enough to call me,” Goldman said on CNN. “I can tell you he was sharper than anyone I’ve spoken to about a very complex, geopolitical, urgent issue.”
8. Illinois Governor JB Pritzker
Also in February, Illinois Governor JB Pritzker (D) said it was “extremely unfair” for a “Trump appointee,” referring to special counsel Robert Hur, to “offer his own opinions about the mental acuity or age” of the president.
“I’ve been with the President of the United States many times,” Pritzker said. “He is on the ball. The man knows more than most of us have forgotten.”
9. Senator Chris Coons
Just three weeks ago, Senator Chris Coons (D-DE) insisted that Biden showed not evidence of “mental feebleness,” but is in fact “sharp and commanding.”
“Of course Joe Biden is over 80 years old, and like any human being over 80 years old, that means there’s a little diminished energy,” Coons toldPolitico.
“I think what is highlighted in some of the, in my view, attack reels that I see on other news outlets is not evidence of mental feebleness but is either evidence of a lifelong stutter, or the result of having an incredibly demanding schedule and having served in public life 50 years,” he said. “When I say that I find him sharp and commanding, and I have no concerns about his mental acuity, I’m being honest.”
10. Senator Raphael Warnock
A year ago this month, Senator Raphael Warnock (D-GA) dismissed concerns about Biden’s age, saying “he’s doing just fine.”
Warnock said at an Axios event he thinks Biden “will go down as certainly one of the most effective presidents we’ve seen, certainly in my lifetime.”
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