By Maribel Velazquez
The former first lady Jill Biden confessed that she thought her husband, the former president Joe Bidenwas suffering a stroke during the 2024 presidential debate against donald trumpa performance that ended up marking the beginning of the end of his re-election campaign.
In an interview for the program CBS Sunday Morning, Jill Biden assured that she had never seen the then president in that state and he recognized the emotional impact that seeing him disoriented on stage had on him.
“I was really scared, because I had never seen Joe like that before or since. Ever,” he declared. “As I watched him, I thought, ‘Oh my God, he’s having a stroke.’”
The debate that changed the Democratic campaign
The confrontation between Biden and Trump took place on June 27, 2024 in Atlanta and generated strong doubts within the Democratic Party about the physical and mental capacity of the president to continue in the electoral contest.
During the debate, Biden appeared with a hoarse voice, lost track of several answers and had difficulty completing some solutions. One of the most talked-about moments occurred when he confused an answer about taxes and public health by concluding: “I think we finally beat Medicare.”
The campaign then attributed the president’s performance to a cold andexhaustion due to his intense travel schedule.
Jill Biden denies cognitive decline
Despite the criticism, Jill Biden assured that never observed signs of cognitive decline on her husband, although she admitted that “she was losing her rhythm” due to the demands of the position and her age.
“He was still the same Joe Biden, but he was getting older. It’s very intense work,” he stated during the interview.
Weeks after the debate, Biden officially dropped out of the presidential race and endorsed then-Vice President Kamala Harris as the Democratic candidate against Trump.
The interview is part of a series of conversations related to Jill Biden’s next book and offers new details about the internal moments that the family experienced after the debate that shook American politics.
Keep reading:
- Jill Biden reveals her disappointment in Nancy Pelosi after turning her back on the president
- Melania Trump declines to meet with Jill Biden
