Biden under fire online again for twice confusing living European leaders with dead predecessors in one week
President Biden is taking heat online after he confused former German Chancellor Angela Merkel and deceased leader Helmut Kohl on Wednesday, just days after a similar episode.
President Biden is taking heat online after he confused German Chancellor Angela Merkel and Helmut Kohl on Wednesday, just days after another incident during which he said he recently met with a deceased French president.
Biden claimed he spoke in 2021 with the late German Chancellor Helmut Kohl, who died in 2017, while recalling past conversations with world leaders during a fundraising event on Wednesday. The G7 meeting in 2021 was not attended by Kohl, as he had been dead for four years, but by former German Chancellor Angela Merkel.
Days before, on Sunday, Biden told an audience in Las Vegas about a meeting he had with French President Emmanuel Macron during the same G7 meeting in England, but confused the current French leader with late French President François Mitterrand.
BIDEN TELLS CROWD HE RECENTLY MET WITH MITTERRAND, FORMER FRENCH PRESIDENT WHO DIED IN 1996
"I sat down and I said, ‘America’s back,’" Biden recalled. "And Mitterrand from Germany – I mean from France – looked at me and said…"
Mitterrand was France's president between 1981 and 1995. He died in 1996.
Biden's second mistake on the names of world leaders in one week caused some commentators online to express worry over Biden's age and mental acuity.
"Joe Biden is 81 years old," attorney Marina Medvin wrote on X. "He is running to be President again. Biden will be 82 through 86 during his second term."
"Nothing to see here," political influencer John Cardillo sarcastically wrote. "Just the 81 yr old dementia-ridden POTUS with his finger on the nuclear trigger confusing Macron with Mitterand who died in 1996, but also confusing Mitterand with Merkel in the same thought-string."
"First he talked to Mitterrand, and now Kohl," political commentator Ian Miles Cheong wrote. "Joe Biden either talks to dead people or his senility is kicking into high gear. This is actually pretty common for people with Alzheimer’s."
Biden's most recent gaffes have even drawn criticism from his supporters in the media world.
"The Late Show" host Stephen Colbert mocked Biden on Tuesday for his Mitterrand gaffe, joking that Biden is so old he can actually speak with dead world leaders.
"If Biden does debate Trump, it’s going to be a challenging thing to avoid any big gaffes. Just this past Sunday, during a speech in Las Vegas, Biden said he had a conversation in 2021 with former president Francois Mitterrand," Colbert said. "Just one problem: Mitterrand died in 1996."
He continued, "Now, everyone is saying he meant Macron and saying the wrong name could happen to anyone. You know how it is. You’re on a date with someone new, you go back to their place, things are getting pretty hot and heavy, and then in a moment of passion, you accidentally scream out the name of long-dead French President Francois Mitterrand."
Fox News' Elizabeth Pritchett and Alexander Hall contributed to this report.
