Trump Calls On Biden To Debate ‘For The Good Of the Country’
Former President Donald Trump has dropped a challenge at the feet of President Joe Biden: Get on a debate stage with him “for the good of the country.”
The challenge came just ahead of special counsel Robert Hur’s bombshell report following his investigation into Biden’s mishandling of classified information in which he revealed that the current president could not remember key dates and events such as when he was vice president and when his son Beau died of brain cancer.
During an interview with Dan Bongino for his radio show, the former president expressed doubt about Biden’s ability to stay in the race. Nevertheless, he called on Biden to engage in a debate “immediately,” reiterating a previous offer to conduct a post-Super Bowl interview after the White House announced that Biden would miss the event for the second consecutive year.
“And I don’t think he’s going to run. I don’t know if it’s donors or otherwise. It might be his family. It might be something,” Trump said. “I don’t think he’s gonna run, but I’d like to call for, immediately, debates. I’d like to debate him now because we should debate. We should debate for the good of the country. So I will officially go on your show…”
“Oh, wow! Look at that! We’re breaking news: Mr. President Donald J. Trump calls for debates against Joe Biden. I mean, that’s great. We’re breaking some news here!” Bongino said in response.
“I am officially doing that. I also put out, you probably noticed, that I’ll take his spot at the Super Bowl if they want. We’ll get very good ratings,” Trump added.
On Thursday evening, Fox News host Laura Ingraham discussed Hur’s findings with contributor and former House Speaker Newt Gingrich, noting at one point during the segment that Democrats were already refuting Hur’s characterizations of Biden’s mental capacity by remarkably claiming that he did not display any shortcomings in their presence.
Ingraham noted that Sen. Mark Kelly (D-Ariz.) claimed to CNN that he had not seen any signs that Biden had “poor memory,” while Sen. Richard Blumenthal (D-Conn.) said, “I’ve talked to him for hours on end as recently as a couple of months ago,” going on to say he is “as sharp as ever.”
“I mean, Newt, come on,” Ingraham said, before adding:
I have it on good authority…a friend of mine was in the White House a couple of weeks ago, and she is not a Trump fan, let me just say this… She was up close and personal with the president, and was shocked — her words were ‘shocked’ about his state.
Hur’s documentation of Biden’s substantial loss of mental capacity will also renew arguments among what is now a large majority of Americans — based on the most recent surveys — that they do not believe the president can serve another four-year term, much less serve out his current term.
Just the news notes:
Hur’s 388-page report released Thursday may have spared Biden the spectacle of a criminal prosecution similar to that his Justice Department imposed on Donald Trump, but it delivered a devastating blow to the 46th president’s re-election hopes by going out of its way to explain criminal charges weren’t levied in part because jurors might see Biden as a dottering, forgetful old man incapable of criminal intent.
“Mr. Biden will likely present himself to the jury, as he did during his interview with our office, as a sympathetic, well-meaning, elderly man with a poor memory,” Hur wrote in explaining his rationale for refusing prosecution. “…It would be difficult to convince a jury they should convict him – by then a former president who will be at least well into his eighties – of a serious felony that requires a mental state of willfulness.”
“Our investigation uncovered evidence that President Biden willfully retained and disclosed classified materials after his vice presidency when he was a private citizen,” the report concluded.
Hur added for good measure he believed Biden suffered from “diminished faculties in advancing age.”
