“Daily Show” host Jon Stewart accused CNN political commentator Bakari Sellers of “gaslighting” by insisting President Joe Biden’s issue is age rather than his cognitive ability during a Thursday podcast.
Many Democrats have been calling for Biden to withdraw from the presidential race following his debate performance against former President Donald Trump, which prompted concerns about the president’s cognitive ability. Stewart told Sellers on “The Weekly Show with Jon Stewart” that the commentator is not being forthright by suggesting Biden’s problem is simply “age” rather than “cognitive decline.” (RELATED: Briefing Erupts After Multiple Reporters Bombard KJP With Questions About Neurologist Visiting White House)
WATCH:
‘Stop Gaslighting’: Jon Stewart Confronts CNN Commentator Claiming Biden Is Just ‘Old’ pic.twitter.com/GwLe7OMU1T
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“I think that you are soft-selling the more fundamental aspect of people viewing somebody who, I’ll be perfectly honest with you, I don’t know of a job interview that you could have gone on and delivered the performance that was delivered by Joe Biden and gotten a job,” Stewart told Sellers. “And I’m not talking about the presidency; I’m talking about like cashier at Home Depot, like a job that you would not think, ‘Okay, that is the hardest job in the entire world.'”
“The only problem with that, John, the only problem with framing it as such is the fact that you discount everything that he’s accomplished in the first three and a half years,” Sellers retorted.
Stewart told Sellers he was mistaken and that Biden is campaigning for another term, not on what he did in his first term.
“But nothing happens in a vacuum … My friends on the left, we want to only magnify what we saw at the debate, which is fine, I get it. We’re talking about age,” Sellers said. “But I’m also talking about the accomplishments prior to and the threat that is right down the road … We do ourselves a disservice by saying, ‘Our guy is old.’ We know that. He shuffles. We know that.”
“It’s not old … Bakari. It is cognitive decline. It’s not just age; it’s cognitive decline,” Stewart said.
Former Obama aide Jon Favreau chimed in to say that even if Biden is in cognitive decline, he has “an inability to communicate,” which is a requirement for a presidential candidate.
“Or reassure us that here’s how we operate in that environment. But to suggest that this discounts three and a half years, it doesn’t,” Stewart continued. “But it does give you a window into the next four. And if you look at his performance in 2020 versus his performance in 2024, there is an inexorable decline. It’s undeniable. So what I don’t understand is, okay, fine, he stays, but deal with it head-on. Stop pretending, stop gaslighting.”
Sellers said “that’s fine” to discuss Biden’s cognitive ability and not “gaslight” about it, but suggested it’s more important to focus on Trump, whom he called “a fucking monster.”
“That’s what we’re worried about. We’re worried about the monster,” Favreau said.
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