Former first lady Jill Biden feared her husband had been drugged as she watched his disastrous presidential debate performance in June 2024, according to a report in her new memoir. The Atlantic obtained a copy of “View from the East Wing,” which is set to be published next Tuesday, and the book reportedly details her alarm as President Joe Biden, then aged 81, blundered his way through the televised face-off with now-President Donald Trump.
Jill Biden's Immediate Reaction
“Is he short-circuiting?” Jill Biden is said to have thought. “Is this a stroke? I felt like we were watching an AI hologram of the man we knew, and the hologram was glitching. Has he been drugged?”
Jill Biden denies there were signs her husband’s mental health was failing ahead of the debate in Atlanta, despite questions being raised about his fitness for a second term long before that night. “The truth was, Joe was not who he was on a day-to-day basis in that debate,” she reportedly writes.
Similar Comments in CBS Interview
Jill Biden made similar comments about her husband’s showing at the 90-minute debate in an interview with CBS News, which is scheduled to air Sunday. “I don’t know what happened. As I watched it, I thought, ‘Oh, my God, he’s having a stroke.’ And it scared me to death,” she said in a preview clip released Wednesday.
Joe Biden’s shaky, mumbling and at times incoherent performance paved the way for the president to halt his reelection campaign roughly a month later, and for Democrats to nominate Vice President Kamala Harris in his place.
Aftermath and Support
Despite her apparent concerns, the former first lady reportedly continued to encourage Joe Biden not to throw in the towel in the immediate aftermath of the debate, with an aide emphasizing the couple had long been in “foxholes together” and would ride out the political turbulence.
