Get the free digest
Politics

Biden ripped for ‘totally delusional’ claim about debate that preceded his 2024 exit

Former President Joe Biden is facing sharp backlash after dismissing his disastrous 2024 debate performance against President Donald Trump as "not very consequential" — despite dropping out of the presidential race just 24 days later.

✦ Extractive summary — built from the sources' own reporting•From 3 sources•2 min read•Updated November 11, 2026, 8:14 PM UTC
Key points
  • Former President Joe Biden would not have run for reelection in 2024 if he had known about his cancer, he said in an interview released Wednesday in which he also sought to downplay the historic debate performance that helped end his political career.
  • Biden also downplayed his poor June 2024 debate performance against Trump that contributed to his exit from the Democratic ticket a month later.
  • His weak showing on the debate stage led to mounting calls within his party for him to withdraw, an effort eventually backed by longtime friends and allies such as former House Speaker Nancy Pelosi.

First of all, I thought there’d be another debate, which there wasn’t." JILL BIDEN SAYS SHE THOUGHT JOE WAS HAVING A STROKE DURING HIS DISASTROUS 2024 DEBATE PERFORMANCE "But notwithstanding the fact that there wasn’t another debate, it didn’t disturb me because it wasn’t consequential," he added.

Additional details
  • It triggered an outpouring of public support — but it also raised questions about how doctors failed to catch the cancer earlier and whether it might have contributed to Biden’s apparent decline toward the end of his term.
  • Biden, then the president, repeatedly lost his train of thought led to widespread Democratic pressure to end his campaign, which Mr.
  • I’m surprised that it wasn’t, you know, the public wasn’t notified a long time ago because to get to [a Gleason score of] 9, that’s a long time,” President Donald Trump told reporters shortly after Biden’s announcement.
  • "If I had known that I was feeling lousy because I had cancer, I would have not gone forward because I don't think an 80-year-old man with cancer should be running," he said in the interview with People magazine, which was conducted last week following Democrats’ big midterm wins and ahead of his upcoming memoir’s release.
  • Prior to his diagnosis, Biden hadn’t been screened for prostate cancer since 2014.

How this summary was made: extractive summary — built from the sources' own reporting. It is drawn only from the reporting of the sources listed below — read the originals for full detail. How we summarize →

Advertisement

Every article behind this summary — 3 articles from 3 outlets

NYT PoliticsNovember 11, 2026, 8:14 PM UTC → Fox NewsNovember 11, 2026, 6:44 PM UTC → PoliticoNovember 11, 2026, 3:29 PM UTC →

Related stories