Politics

‘He Never Completed A Sentence’: Donors Worried About Biden’s Mental State A Year Before Debate, Woodward Claims

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Democrat donors were worried about President Joe Biden’s mental acuity in June 2023, one year before the disastrous debate performance in June of this year, according to a new book by famed journalist Bob Woodward.

Woodward, one of The Washington Post reporters who brought the Watergate scandal to light in the 1970s, describes how Biden’s apparent mental decline began to trouble wealthy donors at fundraising events in June 2023, approximately an entire year before Biden struggled to produce coherent sentences during the nationally-televised debate against former President Donald Trump, Woodward claims in his new book “War,” according to Alex Thompson of Axios. The debate performance eventually led to Biden’s replacement at the top of the ticket with Vice President Kamala Harris, who has since dodged questions about her awareness of Biden’s apparent cognitive decline.

“The first fundraiser hosted by Kevin Scott, the chief technology officer at Microsoft, at his home in Los Gatos on June 19, was attended by 38 guests, including some of the most serious Democratic donors in the valley. The event raised $2.7 million for Biden’s re-election fund,” Woodward writes in his book, according to excerpts shared on social media by Thompson. “Guests, however, said that Biden was ‘frighteningly awful.’ It was ‘like your 87-year-old senile grandfather’ wandering around the room, saying to women guests, ‘your eyes are so beautiful.'”

‘Why Would You Continue To Pretend?’: Piers Morgan Confronts Devout Biden Supporter Who Defends Mental Fitness pic.twitter.com/Kz5UGBl0N7

— Daily Caller (@DailyCaller) July 25, 2024

Woodward claims that donors were similarly “surprised and unsettled” by Biden’s evident lack of mental acuity at a different June fundraiser held at the Four Seasons in New York City. At that event, Biden could not recall the word “veteran” and called on the attendees to help him find the word for someone who formerly served in the armed forces, Woodward reported in his book.

Biden’s mental decline was also on full display at another June 2023 fundraiser in Chevy Chase, Maryland, Woodward writes in the book. Guests characterized the president’s performance at that particular event as “painful,” according to Woodward.

“He never completed a sentence,” Bill Reichblum, the cofounder and president of Liberties Journal Foundation who attended the event, told Woodward. “He would start to talk about something, jump somewhere else. He told the same story three times in exactly the same way and it meandered so much … It was striking.”

“Frankly, my impression was there were times it was as though we didn’t exist,” Reichblum continued. “He was just rambling and talking as to what came in his head,” he said, adding that Biden seemed to him like an elderly relative who speaks but “makes no sense.”

The White House did not respond immediately to a request for comment.

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