Former President Donald Trump said Friday that people shouldn't feel "too bad" about Vice President Joe Biden, who announced his cancer diagnosis earlier this month, calling it "evil" and adding to criticism of the way information about his health condition has been handled.
“Biden has been a somewhat moderate person throughout his life,” Trump said. “Not a smart man, but somewhat evil. If you feel sorry for him, don’t feel too much, because he’s a savage. What he did to his political opponent and to many others, Biden has hurt a lot of people, so I don’t feel any pity for him.”
The comments come just days after Trump and other Republican figures raised questions about whether Biden had concealed his illness from the public. Last week, Trump said that while he was “very saddened” by the news, he was “surprised” that “the public wasn’t notified sooner.”
Republican Vice President JD Vance also questioned why Americans didn't have more information about Biden's health. Donald Trump Jr. called the news "probably another cover-up," while Congressman Ronny Jackson, a former White House physician under the Trump administration, called it "incredible" that Biden's diagnosis was "overlooked," accusing doctors of prioritizing political coverage over medical care.
On the other hand, Rep. Greg Murphy (R-NC), who is also a physician, said that while he believes Biden's mental abilities have been covered up, it is medically irresponsible to assume that his prostate cancer has also been hidden.
Biden spokesman Chris Meagher denied claims that the diagnosis had been kept secret, noting that the last documented examination was in 2014 and that there had been no prior diagnosis. On May 18, it was officially announced that President Biden had been diagnosed with a more aggressive form of prostate cancer.
However, experts immediately raised questions about whether the diagnosis had been made much earlier. Oncologist Ezekiel Emanuel, a pandemic adviser to the Biden administration, said the president “has likely had this for years.”