President Joe Biden appears to have confused the details of the death of his son, Beau Biden, during a speech in Colorado.
On Wednesday, Biden said, “I say this as a father of a man who won the Bronze Star, the conspicuous service medal, and lost his life in Iraq.”
Watch the video below:
WATCH: President Biden tells Colorado crowd his son Beau “lost his life in Iraq.”
— Breaking911 (@Breaking911) October 13, 2022
Beau Biden, a decorated war veteran, died of brain cancer in 2015
pic.twitter.com/iqijnlxPrK
Beau Biden died of brain cancer in 2015.
The president has previously suggested his son’s cancer may have been linked to the burning of waste at U.S. military installations in Iraq.
Beau Biden served in Iraq in 2009 at two bases that used burn pits.
“Science has recognized there are certain carcinogens when people are exposed to them,” Joe Biden told PBS’ Judy Woodruff in a 2018 interview.
He added, “Depending on the quantities and the amount in the water and the air, [they] can have a carcinogenic impact on the body.”
Still, he noted he was not aware of “any direct scientific evidence” linking the burn pits to Beau Biden’s cancer.
PBS reports, “A 2011 National Academy of Sciences investigation into the health hazards of burn pits, commissioned by the Veteran Affairs Department, found ‘inadequate/insufficient evidence of an association between exposure to combustion products and cancer, respiratory disease, circulatory disease, neurologic disease, and adverse reproductive and developmental outcomes in the populations studied.’”
“However, the academy’s 15-member expert panel also noted ‘information that would have assisted the committee in determining composition of the smoke from burn pits, which would have helped assess health hazards, was not available,’ according to its report, ‘The Long-Term Health Consequences of Exposure To Burn Pits in Iraq and Afghanistan,'” it added.
In August, the president signed a bill that expands medical benefits for veterans who were exposed to burn pits.
According to The New York Times, “The new law, known as the PACT Act, makes it easier for veterans who believe they were exposed to toxins during their service to apply for medical benefits from the Department of Veterans Affairs. The law creates a $280 billion stream of federal funding, making it one of the largest expansions of veterans benefits in American history.”
“Toxic smoke, thick with poisons, spreading through the air and into the lungs of our troops,” Biden said.
He added, “When they came home, many of the fittest and best warriors that we sent to war were not the same. Headaches, numbness, dizziness, cancer. My son, Beau, was one of them.”
The president labeled the legislation the “most significant law our nation has ever passed to help millions of veterans who are exposed to toxic substances during their military services.”
