The first presidential debate between US President Joe Biden and former US President and Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump is projected on a screen projector during a watch party hosted by the Michigan Conservative Coalition in Novi, Michigan, US on June 27, 2024.
Credit: Reuters Photo
Atlanta: President Joe Biden and his Republican rival Donald Trump sparred over the state of the economy, border, foreign policy, abortion and national security during the first of presidential debates as they called each other a liar and the worst president in the history of the US.
During their roughly 90-minute debate defined by personal attacks on Thursday night, Biden called Trump a sucker and loser. "I was recently in France for D-Day, and I spoke to all about those heroes that died. I went to the World War II cemetery — the World War I cemetery he refused to go to,” Biden, the presumptive candidate of the Democratic Party, said, referring to Trump, who declined to visit the cemetery in 2018.
"He was standing with his four-star general, and he told me, he said, ‘I don’t want to go in there, because they're a bunch of losers and suckers. My son was not a loser. He’s not a sucker. You’re the sucker. You’re the loser,” Biden said.
Trump said that the quotes were made up in a third-rate magazine and he later fired the general.
On the age factor, 81-year-old Biden reminded that 78-year-old Trump is just three years younger than him.
Trump called Biden a criminal after the latter called him a “convicted felon,” referring to his conviction in a New York hush-money case.
"Joe could be a convicted felon with all of the things that he’s done, he’s done horrible things. This man is a criminal. This man, you’re lucky, you’re lucky, I did nothing wrong. We have a system that was rigged and disgusting,” Trump said.
“When he talks about a convicted felon, his son (Hunter Biden) is a convicted felon, at a very high level,” he alleged.
As the two leaders sparred over various issues, Biden accused Trump that he does not know what he is talking about.
“He has no idea what the hell he’s talking about. I’ve never heard so much foolishness. This is the guy who wants to get out of NATO. You’re going to stay in NATO? He’s going to pull out of NATO,” Biden said.
Biden alleged that Trump has the morals of an alley cat. “How many billions of dollars do you owe in civil penalties for, for molesting a woman in public, for doing a whole range of things, for having sex with a porn star on the night — while your wife was pregnant? What are you talking about? You have the morals of an alley cat,” he said.
“Could you ever think you heard any president say that ‘I’m going to seek retribution? This guy has no sense of American democracy,” Biden said.
Trump slammed his successor Biden on his immigration policies, alleging that it made the country insecure.
“We're literally, an uncivilized country now. He doesn't want it to be. He just doesn't know. He opened the borders nobody's ever seen anything like, and we have to get a lot of these people out and we have to get them out fast because they're going to destroy our country,” Trump said.
“They (illegal immigrants) are living in luxury hotels in New York City and other places. Our veterans are on the street. They're dying because he doesn't care about our veterans. He doesn't like the military at all, and he doesn't care about our veterans,” he asserted.
Biden responded strongly against Trump. ”Every single thing he said is a lie, every single one. For example, veterans are a hell of a lot better off since I passed the PACT Act. One million of them now have insurance and their families have it,” he said.
“And his group opposed that. We're also in a situation where we have great respect for veterans. My son spent a year in Iraq, living next to one of those burn pits, came back with stage 4 glioblastoma. I was recently in France for D-Day, and I spoke about those heroes that died,” he said.
Trump said that during his presidency they killed terrorists overseas. “The people we killed are al-Baghdadi and Soleimani. The two greatest terrorists… And it had a huge impact on everything, not just border, on everything…,” he said.
“They're killing our people in New York, in California, in every state in the union because we don't have borders anymore. Every state is now a border. And because of his ridiculous, insane, and very stupid policies, people are coming in and they're killing our citizens at a level that we've never seen. We call it migrant crime,” Trump said.
“I call it Biden migrant crime. They're killing our citizens at a level that we've never seen before, and you're reading it like these three incredible young girls over the last few days. One of them, I just spoke to the mother, and they just had the funeral for this girl, 12 years old. This is horrible, what's taken place, what's taken place in our country,” said the former president.
Trump also slammed Biden on his foreign policy that could not stop the war in Ukraine and the Middle East.
“This is a war (Ukraine) that never should have started. If we had a leader in this war -- he led everybody along. He's given $200 billion now or more to Ukraine. That's a lot of money. I don't think there's ever been anything like it. Every time that Zelenskyy comes to this country, he walks away with $60 billion,” Trump said.
“He's the greatest salesman ever. And I'm not knocking him, I'm not knocking anything. I'm only saying, the money that we're spending on this war, and we shouldn't be spending. It should have never happened. I will have that war settled between Putin and Zelenskyy as president-elect before I take office on January 20th,” he said.
Biden in response called Russian President Vladimir Putin a war criminal.
“He's killed thousands and thousands of people. He has made one thing clear; he wants to reestablish what was part of the Soviet empire, not just a piece, he wants all of Ukraine. That's what he wants. And then, you think he'll stop there? Do you think he'll stop when he takes Ukraine?” he said.
“What do you think happens to Poland? What do you think about Belarus? What do you think happens to those NATO countries?... And by the way, all that money we give Ukraine from weapons, we make here in the United States. We give them the weapons, not the money at this point,” Biden said.
Responding to a question on the war in the Middle East, Biden said everyone from the UN Security Council, straight through to the G7, to the Israelis and Benjamin Netanyahu himself have endorsed his peace plan put forward by him.
“It has three stages to it. The first stage is to trade the hostages for a ceasefire. The second phase is a ceasefire with additional conditions. The third phase is, no, the end of the war. The only one who wants the war to continue is Hamas,” he said, adding the US was pushing hard to get them to accept it.
“We're providing Israel with all the weapons they need and when they need them. And by the way, I'm the guy that organised the world against Iran when they had a full-blown intercontinental ballistic missile attack on Israel,” he said.
“We saved Israel…We continue to send our experts and our intelligence people as to how they can get Hamas like we did bin Laden,” Biden said.
Trump said he would let Israel finish its job against Hamas.
“As far as Russia and Ukraine, if we had a real president, the president that knew that was respected by Putin, he would have never invaded Ukraine,” he said.
“…I will tell you what happened. He was so bad with Afghanistan. It was such a horrible embarrassment, the most embarrassing moment in the history of our country that when Putin watched that and he saw the incompetence that he should have fired those generals like I fired,” Trump said.
“So, he's got no love lost, but he should have fired those generals. No general got fired for the most embarrassing moment in the history of our country, Afghanistan, where we left billions of dollars of equipment behind. We lost 13 beautiful soldiers. And 38 soldiers were obliterated,” he said.
In the end, Trump was asked if he would accept the results of the 2024 election. The former president said he'll accept the election result if he thinks it's fair. However, Biden said, “I doubt whether you'll accept it.”