Jill Biden feared her husband was having a stroke as she watched the then-US president Joe Biden stumble through a disastrous debate performance that led to the end of his 2024 re-election campaign, the former first lady says.
"I was frightened, because I had never ever seen Joe like that before or since. Never," Jill Biden told CBS News in an interview scheduled to air on Sunday.
Joe Biden's shaky, mumbling and sometimes confused delivery against Donald Trump in June 2024 gave fuel to questions voters already had about his fitness for a second term.
During the testy 90-minute debate, the then-81-year-old repeatedly hesitated when giving answers, misspoke and did not always answer coherently.
His attempts to explain away his performance and offer reassurance that he could handle four more years of the demanding job did little to assuage voters.
Former First Lady Jill Biden previously said she thought then-President Biden did a "great job" after his 2024 debate. She now tells CBS News that she thought he was "having a stroke." https://t.co/JVINZzMu0h pic.twitter.com/O2e7mgsSIo
— Akayla Gardner (@gardnerakayla) May 27, 2026
Under mounting pressure from within his party, he stepped aside, and Democrats nominated Vice President Kamala Harris.
"I don't know what happened," Jill Biden said in the interview.
"As I watched it, I thought, 'Oh, my God, he's having a stroke.' And it scared me to death."
The former first lady is promoting a book due out next week View from the East Wing: A Memoir.
Harris took over as the Democratic nominee in July but lost the November election to Trump.
with DPA
.png?w=600)
