President Biden’s campaign repeatedly avoided answering a direct question during Thursday night’s CNN presidential debate about whether Biden plans to use drugs to enhance his performance.
Biden’s debate opponent, former President Donald Trump, has called for Biden to take a drug test before the showdown, and lawmakers have joined in. Advocates for testing have suggested Biden might be trying to allay growing concerns about his mental ability.
In response to the controversy, Fox News Digital reached out to the Biden campaign, the White House and the Trump campaign to ask whether each candidate plans to use performance-enhancing drugs during the debate.
The Biden campaign twice avoided giving a direct answer to that question.
“Donald Trump is so afraid of being held accountable for his harmful policies of attacking reproductive freedom and cutting Social Security that he and his allies are resorting to desperate and patently false lies,” Biden campaign spokesperson Lauren Hitt told Fox News Digital on Wednesday night.
Most of Biden’s rally appearances have been shorter than a sitcom, fueling concerns about his stamina.
According to a new New York Times/Siena College poll, former President Trump (left) is leading President Biden by four percentage points. (Getty Images)
When pressed in a subsequent email for a “yes” or “no” answer, Hitt said his original statement answered the question.
“The drug allegations against Trump are ‘desperate and patently false lies,'” Hitt added.
The White House did not respond to Fox News Digital’s request for comment.
In contrast, the Trump campaign issued a direct response to a question about whether Trump plans to take performance-enhancing drugs for the debate.
“Absolutely not,” Trump campaign national spokesperson Carolina Leavitt told Fox News Digital.
She added, “President Trump is naturally endowed with elite stamina and has no need for performance enhancing drugs, while many say Joe Biden will take drugs at debates just like he did during the State of the Union, yet President Trump has repeatedly asked Joe Biden to participate in drug testing. What is the Biden campaign hiding?”
Despite accusations from political opponents, there is no clear evidence that Biden has used performance-enhancing drugs or other similar substances while in office.
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Still, Trump called on Biden to submit to a drug test before Thursday night’s debate and has previously suggested Biden uses drugs to enhance his cognitive functioning. In launching his challenge to Biden, Trump offered to submit to a drug test himself.
Former White House physician and current Republican congressman from Texas, Ronny Jackson, has also called for Biden to undergo a pre-debate drug test. In a recent explosive Wall Street Journal interview, Jackson cited dozens of lawmakers and administration officials who said Biden was losing his mental edge.
President Biden speaking in Los Angeles. (AP Photo/Damien Dvarganes)
“This is a Biden-specific concern based on the inexplicable change in his demeanor on Inauguration Day. [State of the Union]Jackson previously told Fox News Digital: “President Trump has been the same his entire life and there have been no changes of any concern. President Trump has previously offered to become president if Biden becomes president.”
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In response to the Wall Street Journal report, the White House dismissed the unflattering portrayal of the president as nothing more than partisan politics aimed at mocking the “smart and competent” Biden.
Earlier this year, special counsel Robert Hur raised further concerns about Biden’s mental acuity in a report detailing his handling of classified documents after serving as vice president in the Obama administration.
President Biden salutes as he arrives at an event in the Indian Treaty Room at the White House, Monday, November 27, 2023, in Washington, DC. (Michael Reynolds/EPA/Bloomberg via Getty Images)
Hoare announced in February that he would not recommend criminal charges against Biden for possessing classified materials after leaving government, describing the 81-year-old Biden as a “caring, well-meaning older man with a frail memory.”
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“Based on our direct interactions and observations with him, he is someone about whom many jurors would be inclined to have reasonable doubt,” Heo wrote in the report. “It would be difficult to persuade a jury that a former president in his mid-80s should be found guilty of a felony requiring a willful mental condition.”
Former President Trump addressed supporters at a local candidate rally in Wilkes-Barre, Pennsylvania, on September 3, 2022. (Spencer Pratt/Getty Images)
The findings sparked widespread outrage as Biden was effectively deemed too cognitively impaired to be charged with a crime yet still hold the presidency.
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The report has been cited repeatedly by critics and the media amid a series of Biden gaffes and missteps in recent weeks.
These include former President Obama grabbing Biden by the wrist and trying to pull him off the stage at a fundraiser in Los Angeles this month; a moment at a world leaders’ gathering in Italy this month when Biden took a few steps away from the group to give a thumbs up to parachutes, after Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni told Biden to return to the world leaders; and a viral video showing the president standing nearly motionless at a Juneteenth concert event at the White House.
White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre last week referred to a recent video showing Biden “freezing” in public, calling the footage “disinformation” spread by “right-wing critics.”
“They’re cheap fakes. … They’re done with bad faith. And some of your news organizations have made it very clear that right-wing critics of the president have credibility issues because fact-checkers have repeatedly caught them spreading misinformation and disinformation,” she said.
Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni gives instructions to President Biden during the G7 event. (Fox News/Pool)
Fox News Digital reported earlier this week that, following Biden’s closed-door campaign strategy during the 2020 campaign – which earned him the nickname “Basement Joe” from Trump – Biden has given just three campaign rally speeches longer than 30 minutes this year.
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Biden has spoken for more than 30 minutes just three times out of 11 rallies in 2024. Fox News Digital defines a rally in this case as a campaign event where Biden takes the stage alone, standing at a podium and joined by cheering supporters, as opposed to intimate campaign stops, fundraisers and brief remarks he has made while conducting his presidential duties.
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Moreover, according to data compiled by Fox News, Biden had held 36 press conferences in his official capacity as president as of June 2024, with the average length of each conference being 33 minutes. During the same period in both administrations, Trump held 60 press conferences and Obama held 74.
