No, President Joe Biden did not die nor was he “medivaced” from Las Vegas last week.
After Biden was diagnosed with COVID-19, cutting his Southern Nevada trip short, rumors began spreading on social media about his health.
While isolating in Delaware on Sunday, Biden ended his re-election campaign. And he didn’t make any soft of public appearance until Monday, when he reemphasized his support for Vice President Kamala Harris to take over his operation in a phone call.
The misinformation about the president’s well being was amplified on social media X by far-right commentators, including Turning Points founder Charlie Kirk and journalist Tucker Carlson, both of whom spoke during the Republican National Convention last week.
Kirk wrote that “a source close to Las Vegas Metro,” seemingly referring to the Metropolitan Police Department, had called to tell him that officers last Wednesday — after his COVID diagnosis — were instructed to make way for Biden to be transported to University Medical Center.
The department said Tuesday that this part was true.
The Las Vegas Metropolitan Police Department was notified that President Joe Biden was sick on July 17th during his visit to Las Vegas,” according to a statement. “We did not know the nature of his illness. As a precaution, LVMPD proactively began to shut down roads leading to UMC Hospital.”
The statement added: “The Secret Service then advised LVMPD the President was going directly to Harry Reid International Airport and would be leaving Las Vegas.”
Kirk’s post on Monday, however, said that his source alleged that Metro was “ordered to stand down” because Biden was going to “medivac” to Johns Hopkins.
“Apparently the rumor mill in the police department was that Joe Biden was dying or possibly already dead,” Kirk wrote.
Journalists embedded with Biden recorded him boarding Air Force One at Harry Reid International Airport, and getting off the airplane in Delaware.
Kirk on Tuesday morning shared a video of Biden’s return to Washington D.C. But his previous post — which was still up Tuesday afternoon — had already racked up more than 23 million times on X.
On his show Monday, Carlson read Kirk’s post verbatim. He and his guest, Jack Posobiec, then mocked Metro’s investigation into the deadliest mass shooting in modern U.S. history in Las Vegas, Oct. 1, 2017, and the “secrecy” around it.
A screenshot of a post on the Tucker Carlson Network X account.
“Clearly something is going on here, obviously,” Carlson said. “I don’t know what it is.”
“I know its hallmark, which is secrecy,” Carlson said about the department.
“Secrecy is the hallmark of lying,” he added. “So if you want to know when someone lying, well, I don’t know. Is he hiding something? Well then he’s lying, so, they’re lying.”
Biden, meanwhile, flew back to Washington from Delaware on Tuesday, where he was photographed embarking on Air Force One from Dover Air Force Base and then disembarking from Andrews Air Force Base. He has announced he will address the nation about his decision to end his re-election bid at 5 p.m. Wednesday.
Contact Ricardo Torres-Cortez at rtorres@reviewjournal.com.
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Publish date : 2024-07-23 16:14:00
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