Trump campaign demands apology from Biden after 'ridiculous' cheap fake narrative
The Trump campaign is demanding an apology from the White House and President Biden's campaign for dismissing videos of Biden's public gaffes and miscues as "cheap fakes" and "misinformation" promoted by conservatives.
Following repeated instances of Biden appearing to stand motionless during public events, being guided offstage by family or allies, or appearing confused during public events, the White House slammed such videos as "cheap fakes" promoted by the Trump campaign and its allies. Cheap fakes, under the White House's definition, are understood as real videos that are cropped or edited in an allegedly deceptive manner.
The Trump campaign fired back on Friday that following Biden's debate performance, "everyone sees there’s NOTHING fake about Biden’s decline."
"It’s only been a week since our fantastic team @TrumpWarRoom & @RNCResearch were wrongly accused of editing ‘cheap fakes’ to make Biden look bad," Trump campaign national press secretary Karoline Leavitt posted on X Friday. "The Democrats, and of course their mouthpieces in the Fake News, peddled this ridiculous lie."
"We actually had to spend time fighting ‘journalists’ on this ridiculous narrative and telling them Americans can believe their own eyes!" she continued. "Now everyone sees there’s NOTHING fake about Biden’s decline. We were right and simply sharing the TRUTH!"
"We will take an apology now," Leavitt added, tagging the Biden campaign and a handful of media outlets.
When asked about the Trump campaign's call for an apology, the Biden campaign told Fox News Digital that Trump is a "liar" in addition to "a pathetic loser."
"Trump lied countless times during the debate and so does his campaign, in real life and on the internet. Trump lied Thursday about whether he called fallen soldiers suckers and losers, and he’s still triggered that mainstream media fact checkers called out his cheap fakes. So sure, we will amend our previous statement: Trump is not just a liar he is also a pathetic loser," a spokesperson for the Biden campaign said.
The call for an apology comes after former President Trump and Biden faced off in the 2024 election cycle's first debate on Thursday evening, with Biden subsequently coming under fire from conservatives and his traditional allies for his disastrous performance. The New York Times even called on Biden to drop out of the race over his performance, which underscored already mounting concerns over the president's age and mental acuity.
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Biden's debate performance included him having a raspy voice, losing his train of thought at times, and stumbling over some responses. Vice President Kamala Harris acknowledged this week that Biden had a "slow start" to the debate, but defended his performance overall and his record in office since 2021.
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Leavitt told Fox News Digital that, in addition to apologizing to the campaign, Biden's administration and campaign should "more importantly" apologize to Americans.
"The Biden White House and entire Democrat Party are both directly implicated in the greatest coverup in U.S. political history — and the mainstream media is complicit in their lies to the American public about Joe Biden’s mental state. They owe an apology to not just our campaign, but more importantly to the American people, for this major scandal that has led to the demise of our country over the past four years," she said.
Ahead of the debate, Biden faced criticism for a series of gaffes and missed cues during public appearances, including events abroad with fellow world leaders. Those include: former President Obama taking Biden’s wrist to seemingly lead him offstage at a fundraiser in Los Angeles this month; Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni directing Biden back to a gaggle of world leaders in Italy this month after he took a few steps away from the group to give a thumbs up to a parachutist; and viral video showing the president standing relatively motionless during a Juneteenth concert event at the White House.
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The White House pushed back following criticisms of such videos that they were "cheap fakes," birthing a new 2024 campaign buzz word that was soon mocked by conservatives on social media, who argued that the administration was "gaslighting" Americans.
"They are cheap fakes. . . . They are done in bad faith. And some of your news organizations have been very clear, have stressed that these right-wing . . . critics of the president have a credibility problem, because the fact-checkers have repeatedly caught them pushing misinformation, disinformation," White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre said earlier this month of cheap fakes.
The Biden-Harris campaign also promoted the "cheap fake" narrative, calling them "a huge part of Trump's campaign strategy."
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"Rob Flaherty, Biden-Harris Deputy Campaign Manager: Donald Trump is desperate to distract from his unpopular agenda. That’s why his campaign is deploying ‘cheap fakes,’ which are deceptively edited videos of President Biden. These doctored videos are a huge part of Trump's campaign strategy," the campaign posted on X earlier this month.