Former Democratic Rep. Susan Wild of Pennsylvania claimed President Joe Biden’s “mental acuity” was present in a Wednesday CNN appearance but admitted she was concerned about his ability “to speak.”
Biden announced he would end his reelection bid July 21, endorsing Vice President Kamala Harris for the Democratic nomination for president following weeks of pressure after a poor performance in a June 27 CNN debate with former President Donald Trump. Wild said that “the age issue” and the CNN debate were “factors” working against Biden.
“Susan Page, who you may know, a longtime Washington — very well-respected Washington journalist, she says, ‘Do you believe you could have won in November?’ Biden says, ‘It‘s presumptuous to say that, but I think yes, based on the polling that…’ — and then she jumps in and she says, ‘Do you think you would have had the vigor to serve another four years in office?’ Biden says, ‘I don‘t know. Who the hell knows? So far, so good, but who knows what I’m going to be when I’m 86 years old?’ Would that honesty have helped Democrats four years ago?” CNN host Kasie Hunt asked Wild, who lost her reelection bid in November.
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“That line would not have helped Democrats. And I think that — who knows whether he could have won, but we can’t underestimate the fact that having a woman, a woman of color at the top of the ticket may or may not have not helped Democrats win the presidency,” Wild said. “So, I‘m not sure. But the age issue, the competence issue, that debate performance, those were all huge mitigating factors against Joe Biden. So, hard to say.”
A Wall Street Journal article published Dec. 19 revealed White House aides “insulated” Biden, even from cabinet members, as his health declined, months after similar articles published by outlets earlier in the year generated pushback from some media outlets.
“What do you say to voters who feel like Democrats weren’t honest with them about what they may have known about the president’s cognitive state? I mean, do you feel like you were confident in his mental acuity before that debate?” Hunt asked Wild.
“I was confident in his mental acuity. I did have great concerns about his ability to project and to speak. He’s had a lifelong speech impediment, as we know, but this was something different and I saw it firsthand,” Wild said. “I could be as close as we are now and have difficulty at times understanding what he was saying. That caused me a lot of concern because, as president of the United States, it’s not a — it’s not that you‘re speaking professionally, but it’s an important thing to be able to communicate well. And that really concerned me. But I didn’t have concerns specifically about his cognitive abilities, no.”
Questions about Biden’s age and health arose during his administration and the 2020 campaign. On multiple occasions, Biden said he spoke with people who had died, including claiming to have spoken with former German Chancellor Helmut Kohl, who died in 2017, and former French President Francois Mitterrand, who passed away in 1996 on two occasions in February.
In September 2022, Biden asked for Republican Rep. Jackie Walorski of Indiana at a conference on hunger that took place several weeks after Walorski and two staffers were killed in a car accident.
Biden also suffered multiple falls during his term in office, including one at the Air Force Academy in June 2023, a fall while on his bike in June 2022 and tripping on the steps of Air Force One on multiple occasions. Biden now takes a different set of stairs onto the VC-25, a modified Boeing 747 used as Air Force One, among other concessions to his age.
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