Joe Biden might be ready to move on from the swarm of allegations of inappropriate touching made against him in the last week, but President Trump isn’t going to let him.
Yesterday, Biden tweeted a video in which he responded to the various allegations, saying he would “be more mindful about respecting personal space in the future.” As of this writing, it has gotten over 23,000 retweets and 145,000 likes.
Social norms are changing. I understand that, and I’ve heard what these women are saying. Politics to me has always been about making connections, but I will be more mindful about respecting personal space in the future. That’s my responsibility and I will meet it. pic.twitter.com/Ya2mf5ODts
— Joe Biden (@JoeBiden) April 3, 2019
This afternoon, President Trump tweeted a doctored version of the video and – not surprisingly – it has already gone viral:
WELCOME BACK JOE! pic.twitter.com/b2NbBSX3sx
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) April 4, 2019
Angry liberals, most notably the Krassenstein brothers, were quick to react:
https://twitter.com/EdKrassen/status/1113863112367722497
Except Joe Biden didn’t apologize, contra to how liberals and some in the mainstream media (but I repeat myself) are spinning reporting it. Others, however, noticed:
You’ll notice one word that is conspicuously missing from both the tweet and the video itself. (A lot of people on Twitter sure did!) “I get it, I get it,” Biden says, even as his statement demonstrates that he does not. The idea that social norms are “changing” misses a vital fact: space-invading behavior has always made some women uncomfortable, but until recently few have felt able to say so—particularly to someone as powerful as a senator or the vice president of the U.S.
Biden, as he reminds us in the video, has done a lot of important work to support women over the course of his career. But that does not relieve him of the responsibility to actually hear the women who said his actions unnerved them and provide them with a simple but powerful offering: an apology.
Trump’s tweaking of Biden today on the Twitter machine comes just two days after he verbally jabbed Barack Obama’s former veep at an NRCC dinner:
President Trump: "[Biden] is being taken care of pretty well by the socialists. They got to him. Our former Vice President. I was going to call him. I don't know him well. I was going to say, 'Welcome to the world, Joe. You having a good time, Joe?'" https://t.co/sYEfKs2ZzV pic.twitter.com/2XMEq8OZ7j
— The Hill (@thehill) April 3, 2019
Biden may not have formally declared his 2020 presidential candidacy just yet, but between this, the #MeToo allegations, the emerging Ukrainian scandal, and rumors of political backstabbing, suffice it to say he’s already got his hands full – no pun intended, of course…
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—Sister Toldjah is a former liberal and a 15+ year veteran of blogging with an emphasis on media bias, social issues, and the culture wars. Read her Red State archives here. Connect with her on Twitter.–
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