Right-wing social media users and pundits falsely claimed on social media President Joe Biden attempted to sit in a nonexistent chair on stage at D-Day commemoration ceremony in Normandy on Thursday, even though a longer video showed there was a chair in that spot—a fraught attempt to amplify concerns about the 81-year-old president’s mental fitness.
US President Joe Biden (R) and French President Emmanuel Macron applaud during the US ceremony ... [+]
The Republican Party’s rapid response X account, RNC Research, posted a clip of Biden bending down in a sitting position while on stage between his wife, First Lady Jill Biden, and French President Emmanuel Macron, captioned “Awkward” with a cringing emoji.
The post was viewed more than 2.5 million times as of Thursday afternoon and reshared by prominent Republicans, including Donald Trump Jr. and Rep. Jim Banks, R-Ind.—many of whom claimed Biden tried to sit down even though a chair wasn’t in place.
The video was cut off seconds before Biden does, in fact, sit in a chair that was right below him, after briefly hovering above his seat as he waited for a speaker to finish introducing Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin.
Biden, Macron and Austin delivered remarks at the ceremony commemorating the 80th anniversary of the allied invasion of Nazi-occupied France, widely considered the catalyst to World War II’s end.
The video is the latest example of a deceptively edited or manipulated video spread on social media by Biden adversaries—last year, a video of Biden placing an “I voted” sticker on his granddaughter’s chest was looped to make it appear as if he were inappropriately and repeatedly touching her, prompting Meta to review its content moderation policies after the video was left up on Facebook and some users labeled Biden a “pedophile.”
Biden’s demeanor has come under heightened scrutiny amid concerns that he is too old to serve as president. Thursday’s video comes on the heels of a Wall Street Journal story published Tuesday that included interviews with more than three dozen lawmakers, most of them Republicans, who said Biden appears to be slipping mentally behind closed doors, citing high-stakes meetings in which he allegedly repeated himself, referred to note cards, moved slowly and spoke so softly at times attendees were unable to hear him. In another instance that shone a spotlight on the age concerns, Justice Department Special Counsel Robert Hur earlier this year described Biden as a “well-meaning elderly man with a poor memory” in a report detailing an interview his office conducted with the president in its probe of his handling of classified documents. Biden has repeatedly been captured slipping on the stairs of Air Force One and took a particularly hard fall on stage at an Air Force Academy graduation ceremony last year (his team said he tripped over a misplaced sandbag on stage).
A string of Democratic lawmakers contested the Wall Street Journal report, accusing the reporters of omitting their statements detailing Biden’s mental sharpness. Former House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., wrote on X that the Journal “ignored testimony” from “many” Democrats who detailed the president’s “wisdom, experience, strength and strategic thinking,” accusing the paper of a “hit piece.” The White House also fired back, with spokesperson Andrew Bates telling the paper “House Republicans are making false claims as a political tactic that flatly contradict previous statements made by themselves and their colleagues.” The report, it says, was based on interviews with more than 45 people, including Democrats, who met with Biden or were briefed on discussion with him. Some of the Democrats spoke to the Journal a second time and emphasized Biden’s strengths, according to the Journal, which quoted Rep. Gregory Meeks, D-N.Y., telling a reporter “They just, you know, said that I should give you a call back,” referring to the White House.
Biden Forgot When He Served As Vice President And Year Of Son’s Death In DOJ Interview (Forbes)