Joe Biden had a lively exchange with a Trump supporter while sporting one of his former rival Donald Trump’s MAGA hats and even received a backhanded compliment for it.
Speaking to firefighters in Shanksville, Pennsylvania, where United Flight 93 crashed, Biden was briefly seen wearing a bright red Trump cap.
In an extended video clip, Biden can be seen joking with a gentleman who makes fun of Biden’s age, asking him to autograph a cap with the presidential seal before asking the president if he remembered his own name.
Biden sarcastically replied: “I can’t remember my name, I’m slow.” The audience roared with laughter.
The vaudevillian banter continued when the man referred to Biden as an “old fart,” to which the commander in chief replied, “Yeah, I’m an old fart… You’d know a lot about that.”
In an extended video clip, Joe Biden had a lively exchange with a Trump supporter while sporting one of his former rival Donald Trump’s MAGA hats and even received a backhanded compliment for it.
After signing the hat, he joked with the man that he needed his Trump MAGA hat, which the man quickly offered.
Biden placed the Trump 2024 cap on top of the other hat he was wearing to loud applause.
The Trump supporter replied: “I’m proud of you now” as the two men shook hands.
Biden, however, had the last laugh, joking: “Remember, don’t eat dogs or cats!”
The president was referring to a claim made by Trump in last night’s debate suggesting that immigrants in Springfield, Ohio, were eating people’s dogs and cats.
The viral moment was originally explained by a White House spokesperson, who said it was to show “bipartisan unity.”
Biden, Trump and Democratic nominee Vice President Kamala Harris attended multiple Sept. 11 commemoration ceremonies on Wednesday, a day after Trump and Harris met for the first time on the debate stage.
The president’s decision came 24 hours after he called attention to himself on Tuesday night as he left the White House for New York by saying that he would “do 9/11.”
President Joe Biden briefly wore one of former President Donald Trump’s red MAGA hats in a gesture the White House said was to show “bipartisan unity.”
Another angle of the video shows the 81-year-old commander in chief wearing the signature red hat in a gesture of “bipartisan unity.”
Biden told relatives at the firehouse that America needed to return to the unity shown after the attacks that killed 2,977 people.
“At the Shanksville Firehouse, President Joe Biden spoke about the country’s bipartisan unity after 9/11 and said we need to get back to that,” White House spokesman Andrew Bates posted on X. “As a gesture, he gave a hat to a Trump supporter, who then said that in the same spirit, POTUS should wear his Trump hat.”
“He used it briefly,” Bates added.
By the time Bates posted his message, Trump supporters were already insisting that Biden, 81, was so “senile” that he didn’t realize what the cap said.
“Attendees told me that Joe Biden looked totally senile at the event, and even wore a red TRUMP 2024 hat while (Harris) was in the room,” wrote Laura Loomer, a conspiracy theorist and top Trump ally. “One attendee asked Biden, ‘Do you even know your name?'” she added, echoing an attack on the president that Trump launched Tuesday night on the debate stage.
Trump War Room account X shared a video of Biden putting on the hat with the caption: ‘Kamala did so poorly at last night’s debate that Joe Biden just put on a Trump hat.’
The group of journalists following the president was not invited into the room as Biden and Harris were meeting with family members affected by the terrorist attack of September 11, 2001.
Pennsylvania is the must-win state for the 2024 election, and with the trip to Shanksville, Biden and Harris were entering Trump’s territory.
Somerset County as a whole voted for Trump over Biden by 78 percent versus 21 percent four years ago.
Biden attends 9/11 23rd anniversary memorial with Vice President Kamala Harris, former New York Mayor Mike Bloomberg, former President Donald Trump and Ohio Senator and vice presidential candidate JD Vance
Signs of support for the Republican candidate were visible from the route of Harris’s motorcade.
A man attending the ceremony at the Flight 93 Memorial was wearing a vulgar anti-Harris T-shirt.
Harris is expected to return to western Pennsylvania on Friday with a campaign stop in Johnstown, Pennsylvania, located in nearby Cambria County.
Cambria County represents one of the most dramatic swings from Democrats to Republicans in the country.
It was represented for years by the late Democratic Rep. John Murtha.
In 2008, President Barack Obama won the county by a hair: 50 percent to Sen. John McCain’s 48 percent.
During the 2020 election, the county went 68 percent for Trump and 31 percent for Biden.
Trump landed at Johnstown Airport shortly after Biden and Harris visited Shanksville.
Kamala Harris looks on during the memorial ceremony at Ground Zero, with Biden in the background, the day after her debate with Trump
The former president was also present alongside Biden and Harris in New York City at a ceremony at Ground Zero.
During the service, the widow of a New York fire chief killed on Sept. 11 criticized Biden for his “flippant” comments.
Joanne Barbara was referring to what the president said he would “do on 9/11” when asked by reporters about his plans to honor Americans killed in the worst terrorist attacks in the nation’s history.
Her husband, FDNY Deputy Chief Gerard “Jerry” Barbara, a 31-year firefighter, died when the South Tower of the World Trade Center collapsed as he was trying to rescue those trapped inside.
“The elected officials here today are showing their respect and reverence to the families of 9/11, or – in the words of our president – ’they are making 9/11,’ a rather flippant comment,” Barbara said during her remarks at a ceremony honoring her late husband.
“Please remember that the families of 9/11 live it every day,” she continued, detailing the pain experienced by those who lost loved ones in the terrorist attack of September 11, 2001.
He also sharply criticized the “outrageous” plea deal that was almost approved for the alleged 9/11 masterminds held at Guantanamo Bay.