President Joe Biden has flown to Delaware and suspended all campaigning after he was diagnosed with COVID-19 during his trip to Las Vegas on Wednesday.
Given the increasing calls for him to step aside as the Democratic nominee in this fall’s presidential election — including that of the powerful California Rep. Adam Schiff, who was head of the House Intelligence Committee and likely will be his state’s next senator — this might well be his last campaign trip as the standard-bearer of his party.
If that happens, however, at least he can say he went out the same way he came in: incoherent, forgetful and making racially insensitive remarks.
According to Reuters, Biden left Las Vegas on Air Force One late Wednesday after testing positive for the virus. White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre said the president “is vaccinated and boosted and experiencing mild symptoms.”
“The White House said Biden planned to spend a long weekend at his Delaware beach house,” Reuters said. “It was unclear how long the sickness would keep him for the campaign trail.”
Judging by Biden’s last major television interview, recorded in Las Vegas before heading back east, the answer might be “permanently.”
In a painful sitdown with Black Entertainment Television, Biden touted that he’d named a black secretary of defense — whom he couldn’t name and then patronizingly referred to as “the black man.”
“It’s all about treating people with dignity,” Biden told Ed Gordon of BET News in a widely circulated clip.
“And it’s about making sure that — look, I mean, for example, look at the heat I’m getting because I named a, uh, the uh, secretary of defense, the black man,” he continued.
“And I named Ketanji Brown,” he added, referring to his nomination of Ketanji Brown Jackson to the Supreme Court. “Because of the people I’ve named.”
When BET won’t edit this out, you know that even black media has had it with this guy:
BIDEN: “Look at the heat I’m getting because I, I named a, uh, the, uh, secretary of defense — the black man” 🥴 pic.twitter.com/PJYzDznpIV
— RNC Research (@RNCResearch) July 18, 2024
By the way, defenders of the Democrats — before you trot out the shopworn excuse that Biden’s obvious organic mental degradation is wholly new information to which nobody had access, consider that this isn’t the first time he’s done this. Not just with any person, mind you, but with Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin — “the black man” — himself.
“I want to thank you both and I want to thank the former general, I keep calling him general, but my, my, uh — the guy who runs that outfit over there — I want to make sure we thank the secretary for all he’s done to try to implement what we just talked about and for recommending these two women for promotion,” the president said during a March 2021 event.
“The guy” was Austin and “that outfit over there” was the Department of Defense.
Whoops: Biden forgets the name of the Pentagon, as well as the name of his secretary of Defense, Lloyd Austin pic.twitter.com/ZtcgHLBIAO
— Tom Elliott (@tomselliott) March 8, 2021
At least he didn’t trot out the fact that Austin was black on that occasion, though. Not that there is any shortage of racially insensitive, weird clips from Biden.
Should Biden resign?
You can pick from hits such as “If you have a problem figuring out whether you’re for me or Trump, then you ain’t black,” or “Poor kids are just as bright and just as talented as white kids,” or his advice to minority parents to help close the education gap caused by segregation: “Play the radio, make sure the television — excuse me, make sure you have the record player on at night, the — the — make sure that kids hear words.”
And, you won’t be surprised to learn, either, that this wasn’t the only gaffe during the BET News interview. Biden trotted out his oft-used, misleading talking point that Trump is one of only two presidents to leave office with fewer jobs in America than when he entered, although this was because of COVID-19. However, he couldn’t quite stick the landing, as the New York Post noted.
“You know, there’s only two presidents in American history who have come to office and left with fewer jobs,” Biden said.
“And the other was a guy we all know very well — um, so uh, I, I call — anyway. Trump is one of them.”
That was Herbert Hoover, Mr. President. He only served a single term in the White House.
From all appearances, you will, as well.
