Democratic Sen. John Fetterman of Pennsylvania defended President Joe Biden’s mental faculties during an interview with the Daily Caller News Foundation on Friday, claiming that he’s never seen him suffer cognitive difficulties.
On Thursday, the Department of Justice released a report by special counsel Robert Hur regarding an investigation into Biden’s unlawful possession of classified information after his term as vice president expired in 2017, which described him as an “elderly man with a poor memory” and stated that he forgot important details about his own life.
Fetterman, who suffered a stroke during his campaign for the Senate in 2022 and has since used speech recognition assistance technology to converse with journalists, told the DCNF on Friday that he believed Biden was “absolutely lucid” and perfectly capable of continuing in office. (RELATED: Special Counsel Finds Joe Biden Willfully Kept Classified Information, Declines To Pursue Criminal Charges)
“Well, a lot of your readers think Trump is fit for office, and I don’t agree with that,” Fetterman told the DCNF. “And I suspect some of your readers don’t feel that President Biden is fit, but they’re both older gentlemen that are running and have made, uh, verbal gaffes, uh, throughout this [campaign].”
Fetterman also alleged that, in his personal experiences with Biden, he has never observed him as having cognitive difficulties.
“Of course not. I’ve been, I’ve been on Air Force One with the President, and on Mary, on Marine One with the President and I’ve been around him and he is absolutely lucid and most, just is a regular guy,” Fetterman said in Biden’s defense.
Watch Biden’s remarks on the report here:
Fetterman indicated that former President Donald Trump, the leading candidate for the Republican presidential nomination, also had exhibited issues of memory and sought to draw an equivalency between the two. “You know, your side and I was like, can’t tell Pelosi and, and Haley apart, and so things come up,” Fetterman said, referring to a rally where Trump claimed that former Gov. Nikki Haley of South Carolina, his primary opponent, was “in charge on security” of the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021.
“So it really comes down to it that they’re both going to be on the, on the ballot and people are going to have their choices of ‘What do we want for the next four years?’ on all of that, instead of getting in arguments on who has this challenge or who has that challenge? And it’s like, he’s going to be on the ballot, Biden is going to be on the ballot. And that’s what we have here in ’24,” Fetterman said.
During a press conference after the report’s release on Thursday, Biden aged 81, appeared to describe President Abdel Fattah el-Sisi of Egypt as the “president of Mexico” and claimed that a rosary belonging to his late son, Beau Biden, which he wears, was from “Our Lady of…,” before pausing for a few moments, without finishing the name of the establishment. Beau Biden, a Catholic like his father, reportedly purchased the rosary from the Basilica of Our Lady of Guadalupe in Mexico City, according to The Huffington Post.
Read Robert Hur’s report about Biden here:
Report on the Investigation Into President Joseph R. Biden, Jr. by Special Counsel Robert Hur by Daily Caller News Foundation on Scribd
Regarding whether Biden’s memory may further recede, Fetterman insisted that it would not be a problem.
“Well, we’re not there and I don’t expect that we’re gonna get there. So it’s just like, I don’t know. I mean, it’s like the Republican side shouldn’t be worrying about that because it has been clear, it’s been clearly, that it’s the same guys at the same age, that has already demonstrated that he has some difficulties.”
Fetterman was joined by other Democratic Senators, who defended Biden in remarks to the DCNF, while also attacking Hur for alleged partisanship.
“I think [what] is just really incredible about this…report, is how unbelievably dismissive and demeaning and disrespectful it was of the President and their descriptions of their conversations with him,” Democratic Sen. Tina Smith of Minnesota told the DCNF. “I mean, you know when you read that, this is coming from a guy who was a Trump appointee. You can see it in the way that he responds, the way that he dismisses the President when, acting as if he can’t recall the death of his beloved son? It’s just really ridiculous.”
“It’s outrageous that he would suggest that the President [doesn’t remember the day his son died],” Democratic Sen. Chris Van Hollen of Maryland told the DCNF as he left the Capitol building.
Others were more measured in their defenses.
“Of course, President Biden is fit for office,” Democratic Sen. Laphonza Butler of California told the DCNF, adding that “we all forget some things every now and then. You should ask me something at seven o’clock at night.”
“I think folks should be judged on how they do the job. And over the last three years, we’ve passed major legislation,” Democratic Sen. Mark Kelly of Arizona told the DCNF, before running down a list of accomplishments.
Republicans, meanwhile, have strongly criticized Biden for his conduct and his remarks.
“I do believe that there were people in the Democratic Party that were keeping [the late] Senator Feinstein here longer than she wanted it to be, for their own political purposes. And in some respects, I see a parallel here. This President’s capabilities have diminished,” Republican Sen. Thom Tillis of North Carolina told the DCNF about whether the 25th Amendment should be considered regarding Biden’s abilities. “I don’t care if you’re 38, 78 or 178. If you’re gonna be the leader of the free world, you got to be on your game 100%, 24/7—365.”
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