In a stunning statement made just two weeks before the 2024 presidential election, President Joe Biden suggested that his predecessor, Donald Trump, should be “locked up.” The remarks were delivered Tuesday during Biden’s visit to a Democratic campaign office in Concord, New Hampshire, as the sitting president made an appearance in the crucial swing state.
“If I said this five years ago, you’d lock me up: We gotta lock him up,” Biden, 81, said to a surprised crowd. His audience responded with enthusiastic applause after a brief four-second pause. Biden then appeared to walk back the comment, adding, “politically, lock him up — lock him out, that’s what we’ve got to do,” in an attempt to clarify that he was speaking figuratively.
President Joe Biden says the quiet part out loud for Democrats about former President Donald Trump: “We gotta lock him up”
He said this just now on the campaign trail in New Hampshire pic.twitter.com/63sdel3eyr
— Ryan Saavedra (@RealSaavedra) October 22, 2024
A person close to Biden, who often misspeaks in public, told The Post that the president’s follow-up comment meant that he hadn’t intended to call for Trump to be incarcerated.
However, the president and his aides typically refrain from commenting at all on the four pending criminal cases against Trump, who contends that a quartet of local and federal indictments last year were politically motivated to aid Biden’s then-re-election campaign.
Trump, 78, was convicted in May by a Manhattan jury of 34 criminal counts of falsifying business records to conceal hush money payments to adult film star Stormy Daniels in the final weeks of the 2016 campaign.
Trump also faces pending federal and state charges in Georgia related to challenging his 2020 election defeat by Biden. And federal prosecutors are attempting to revive another case out of South Florida accusing Trump of mishandling classified records, which a judge dismissed in July.
(Many experts have argued that it was impossible for Trump to get a fair trial.)
This is not the first time Biden has alluded to Trump’s legal challenges. During a recent campaign stop in Pennsylvania, the president taunted Trump by saying, “I think he’s running to stay out of jail.” Trump’s legal woes have become a central talking point in the election, particularly with his sentencing in a Manhattan case, brought by District Attorney Alvin Bragg, scheduled for November 26, a case that even Never Trumpers have said should never have been tried.
The race between Trump and Vice President Kamala Harris, Biden’s running mate, remains tight according to recent polls. A RealClearPolitics average shows Trump with a slight lead in swing states, though the margins are narrow.
Trump’s supporters reacted quickly to Biden’s remarks, expressing outrage over what they view as a politically charged attack. The White House has yet to issue an official statement clarifying the president’s comments.
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