Jill Biden said her husband was examined by doctors following his disastrous 2024 debate performance, the appearance that ultimately ended his presidential campaign.
The former first lady made the remarks Tuesday on MSNBC’s Morning Joe, the same day her White House memoir hit shelves. Earlier in her book tour, Biden said she thought the former president was potentially having a stroke during his debate with now President Donald Trump. (RELATED: Jill Biden Took Joe To Waffle House After Thinking He Had Stroke On Stage)
“But publicly, of course, you said that he did well, you cheered him on that evening. What do you say to people who today wonder if you thought that then, that something, a medical episode had happened. Did you recommend that he go? Did you recommend that he go to a doctor?” the host asked of the moments after the 2024 debate.
“I have a team of doctors around me as first lady. Joe had a team of doctors around him. So, when I saw that, and I was frightened, I was, you know, scared to death to see that, and, but the doctors were there,” the former first lady began, adding that her husband knew when he got off stage that he had messed up.
“And then we got off the stage, and you know, I went to get my stuff. He was checked out by the doctors. They said he’s fine. We went on to do three more events that night and Joe was like he always was, and so to me, as I look back, I mean that was so inexplicable. I just to this day it’s just inexplicable,” she continued.
After former President Joe Biden stumbled his way through his June 2024 debate with Trump, Democrats across the country began to call for the incumbent to drop out of the race.
Nearly a month later, Biden dropped out of the race. The former president issued a statement on X while in quarantine in Delaware after a COVID-19 diagnosis. In a separate statement 30 minutes later, Biden endorsed former Vice President Kamala Harris.
“There were a lot of Democrats, even, who watched that debate performance, thought in some ways they’d been duped, that close advisers to President Biden, perhaps some members of the media, even had protected him enough and kept him out of maybe a rigorous event schedule enough that they could get him along through to election day,” MSNBC’s Morning Joe said to the former first lady. “Is there any truth to that?”
“Really, if we were hiding him behind the scenes, why did we ask the Trump team for the debate? I mean, we were the ones that proposed it, like, if we, if that were true, you know, why did we put him out there?” Jill Biden countered.
“So, you don’t think that he was protected?” the host followed up.
“No, I don’t think it was protected,” she concluded.
The former first lady also provided an update on her husband’s aggressive cancer diagnosis, which came several months after he left the White House.
“Cancer is really tough, and so I’ve … so I would say he’s doing okay,” she said, adding that Biden is tired but still taking the Amtrak and doing speaking engagements.
Jill Biden also told Morning Joe that her husband and former House Speaker Nancy Pelosi recently made up. Pelosi, a longtime Biden ally, did not stand by the former president following the 2024 debate. (RELATED: ‘It Was Disappointing’: Jill Biden Breaks Silence On Pelosi Forcing Her Husband Out Of Nomination)
“I just knew he went back to see Nancy, and then I found out later he said, you know, they said, ‘Peace, let’s be friends,’” the former first lady said of a moment Pelosi and Biden had at a recent funeral.
“And we got in the car, and I said, ‘where did you go? And he told me the story, and I knew she was in the church, because I saw the guest list, of course, but I didn’t see her personally,” she added.