Trump denies he mocked war dead
Biden blasts his rival over report, invokes service of late son
WASHINGTON — President Donald Trump defended himself Friday against accusations that he mocked American war dead as his Democratic rival, Joe Biden, intensified efforts to frame the election as a referendum on the president’s character.
The allegations, sourced anonymously, describe multiple offensive comments by the president toward fallen and captured U.S. service-members, including referring to World War I dead at an American military cemetery in France as “losers” and “suckers” in 2018.
The president and his allies have dismissed the report in The Atlantic magazine as false.
The reported comments, many of which were confirmed independently by the AP, are shining a fresh light on Trump’s previous public disparagement of American troops and military families. That opens a new political vulnerability for the president less than two months from Election Day.
“This is more made up Fake News given by disgusting & jealous failures in a disgraceful attempt to influence the 2020 Election!” Trump tweeted late Thursday, as aides mounted a
concerted defense of the president, with Trump’s campaign and allies taking to social media and broadcast interviews to denounce the report.
Speaking Friday in the Oval Office, Trump denied ever uttering such comments: “It was a terrible thing that somebody could say the kind of things — and especially to me cause I’ve done more for the military than almost anyone anybody else.”
Biden declared Trump “unfit” for the presidency on Friday, delivering an impassioned reaction to the report.
Voice cracking, Biden told reporters that “you know in your gut” Trump’s comments, if true, are “deplorable.”
“I’ve just never been as disappointed, in my whole career, with a leader that I’ve worked with, president or otherwise,” Biden added. “If the article is true — and it appears to be, based on other things he’s said — it is absolutely damning. It is a disgrace.”
He added that “the president should humbly apologize to every Gold Star mother and father, to every Blue Star family that he’s denigrated. Who the heck does he think he is?”
Trump, in the Oval Office said no apology was necessary, because it was a “fake story.”
Trump was alleged to have made the comments in November 2018, as he was set to visit the Aisne-Marne American Cemetery during a trip to France. The White House said the visit was scrubbed because foggy weather made the helicopter trip from Paris too risky and a 90-minute drive was deemed unfeasible. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo told “Fox & Friends” on Friday that he was with the president for a good part of the trip to France. “I never heard him use the words that are described in that article,” Pompeo said.
Biden’s critique was personal. The former vice president often speaks about his pride for his late son Beau’s service in the Delaware Army National Guard. As he spoke, Biden grew angry, raising his voice to rebut Trump’s alleged comments that Marines who died in battle were “suckers” for getting killed.
“When my son was an assistant U.S. attorney and he volunteered to go to Kosovo when the war was going on, as a civilian, he wasn’t a sucker,” Biden declared.
“When my son volunteered to join the United States military as the attorney general, he went to Iraq for a year, won the Bronze Star and other commendations, he wasn’t a sucker!”
Beau Biden died of cancer in 2015.
Biden has framed the election from the start as a referendum on Trump’s character. His allies quickly seized on the reported comments in hopes that could drive a wedge between military families and veterans and Trump.
On a call with reporters hosted by the Biden campaign Friday, Illinois Sen. Tammy Duckworth lambasted Trump for “belittling the sacrifices of those who have shown more bravery than he’s capable of.”
Duckworth, a retired Army National Guard lieutenant colonel who lost both of her legs in the Iraq War, has been a prominent critic of Trump’s handling of military issues. Knocking Trump for allegedly inventing an injury to avoid serving in the Vietnam War, Duckworth said that she’d “take my wheelchair and my titanium legs over Donald Trump’s supposed bone spurs any day.”
Trump also denied calling the late Arizona Sen. John McCain, a decorated Navy officer who was a prisoner of war in Vietnam, a “loser” after his Aug. 2018 death.
Trump acknowledged Thursday he was “never a fan” of McCain and disagreed with him, but said he still respected him and approved everything to do with his “first-class triple-A funeral” without hesitation because “I felt he deserved it.”
In 2015, shortly after launching his presidential candidacy, Trump publicly blasted McCain, saying “He’s not a war hero.” He added, “I like people who weren’t captured.” At the time, Trump also shared a news article on Twitter calling McCain a “loser.”