The 81-year-old chief executive reportedly made the blunder during a Feb. 7 event, where he told the story to a group of Democratic donors in New York City. He also repeated the same story in another fundraiser held on the same day in the Big Apple. Biden was reportedly talking about his first international trip as president to the Group of Seven (G7) Summit in the U.K. when he made the gaffe.
“I showed up … and I sat down and said, ‘America’s back.’ [French President Emmanuel] Macron looked at me and said, ‘For how long?’ How long? Not a joke,” Biden recounted.
“Helmut Kohl said, ‘Joe, what would you think if you picked up the phone and picked up the paper tomorrow and learned in the London Times, on the front page, that 1,000 people stormed the Parliament? Broke down the doors of the House of Commons and killed two [police officers] in the process … [of] trying to stop the election of a prime minister?”
While Biden’s story replaced the American political setting with a British one, it is worth noting that no police officers were killed. In contrast, four protesters died during the riot as a result of the violence. Brian Sicknick, the lone U.S. Capitol Police officer who reportedly died on Jan. 6, actually suffered from a stroke that led to his death the following day.
Kohl (1930-2017) served as the chancellor of West Germany from 1982 to 1990. After the Berlin Wall was torn down, he once again served as the chancellor of a united Germany from 1990 to 1998. Former Chancellor Angela Merkel, who served from 2005 until 2021, was the leader of Germany when Biden attended the G7 Summit.
This was not the first instance Biden allegedly spoke to leaders who have long passed away. On Feb. 4, he reportedly recounted the exact same tale – but this time replacing Kohl with former French President Francois Mitterand (1916-1996). Mitterand was the longest-serving French president, with his tenure lasting from 1981 to 1995, one year before his demise.
Biden sees dead people – a sign of dementia?
According to the New York Post, “Biden’s latest gaffe is one of many verbal blunders he’s committed since taking office” in 2021. These blunders, it added, “have sparked concerns over his mental acuity as he seeks a second term in office.”
In October 2022, Biden sought out the late Rep. Jackie Walorski (R-IN) during a White House event – even though she had died in a car crash eight weeks prior. The president had been thanking several politicians from both the Republican and Democratic parties when he made the gaffe.
“Representative Jackie, are you here? Where’s Jackie? I think she was going to be here,” Biden remarked at the time while on the podium. The gaffe reportedly followed a lengthy statement from the chief executive mourning the demise of the Indiana congresswoman.
When asked about the gaffe involving Walorski, White House Press Secretary Karine Jean-Pierre reportedly said the late congresswoman was “top of mind” for Biden as he had been preparing to host her family. The press secretary did not address questions about the president’s mental health and why he believed Walorski was alive.
The chief executive’s mental gaffes also extend to events that supposedly happened to him, but were debunked in reality. In September 2021, Biden allegedly claimed “spending time at” and “going to” the Tree of Life Synagogue in Pittsburgh where 11 people were killed in 2018 – a claim the synagogue denied.
One in five NHS jobs are now filled by non-UK nationals, new analysis shows.A third of doctors and three in 10 nurses working in the health service have come from abroad - the highest proportion since records began, the analysis of NHS Digital data by the PA news agency reveals. The overall foreign national figure for NHS England in September 2023, 20.4%, is up from 13% in 2016, and 11.9% […]
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