Biden’s 10 most notable gaffes of 2024

By Washington Examiner
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The new year marks a sad farewell for President Joe Biden, the self-proclaimed gaffe-machine in chief who has spoken more memorable word twistings than anyone this side of George W. Bush.

After documenting his best blunders of 2022 and 2023, the Washington Examiner commemorates Biden’s top gaffes of the year for the last time in 2024 — unless he really goes on a tear between now and Jan. 20, when President-elect Donald Trump takes over.

Without further delay, here are President Biden’s most notable verbal slips of the year.

1. Biden confuses random woman for member of Congress

The year started inauspiciously for Biden, who in January mistook a woman he apparently took a picture with for Rep. Deborah Ross (D-NC), who was not present at the time.

“I want to mention congresswoman Deborah Ross, where’s Deborah?” Biden asked during a speech on Bidenomics. “I just had my picture taken with her, that’s probably why she left.”

Eventually, Biden added, “Oh, she couldn’t be here, actually. That’s not true. I got it mixed up.”

It wouldn’t be the last time.

2. Biden mixes up French president with deceased predecessor

Things got messier in February, when Biden confused current French President Emmanuel Macron with former French President François Mitterrand — who died in 1996.

In fact, Biden called the deceased leader “Mitterand from Germany” before partially correcting himself to say “from France.”

“Right after I was elected, I went to what they call a G7 meeting, all the NATO leaders,” Biden, then 81, said. “I sat down, and I said, ‘America is back,’ and Mitterand from Germany — I mean France — looked at me and said, said, ‘You know, why, how long you back for?’”

Biden was making an anti-Trump point about the Jan. 6 Capitol riot, but this and other gaffes did not help his case throughout the year. He followed up days later by confusing former German Chancellor Angela Merkel with her predecessor Helmut Kohl, who died in 2017.

3. MTG taunt prompts State of the Union gaffe

The president was still hoping to be reelected when he made a fiery State of the Union speech in March that was widely praised in the press.

Yet even there he stumbled into a blunder or two. Most notable was when Biden, prompted by Rep. Marjorie Taylor-Greene (R-GA), mentioned the death of Georgia nursing student Laken Riley at the hands of an illegal immigrant. However, he appeared to say “Lincoln Riley” instead.

“What about Laken Riley?” Greene repeatedly yelled out from her seat on the chamber floor.

Biden paused and then looked to his right, where he had set a “Laken Riley” pin that Greene had handed him during his procession onto the floor.

Biden picked up the pin and said, “Lincoln Riley? An innocent young woman who was killed by an illegal! That’s right? But how many of thousands of people are being killed by legals?”

He later said he regretted using the term “illegals.”

4. “Four more years… Pause”

The teleprompter caused more than one issue for Biden during his presidency, including in April, when he appeared to read directions off of it that were intended for the audience.

“Folks, imagine what we can do next. Four more years. Pause,” Biden said before the crowd at his speech began a “four more years” chant.

Biden looked confused for a second, then, appearing to realize what happened, broke into his trademark grin.

Wasting no time, Trump pointed out the gaffe shortly after, with his campaign sharing the clip and calling Biden “cognitively impaired.”

5. Vice President during the pandemic?

Biden enjoyed a long run as vice president from 2009 to early 2017, but appeared to imply he held the post in 2020 during remarks this May.

“When I was vice president, things were kinda bad during the pandemic,” he said. “Barack [Obama] said to me, ‘Go to Detroit, and help fix it!’”

Going to Detroit probably wouldn’t have helped much during the pandemic — if Biden would even be allowed to go — but the White House later corrected the transcript to read “during the recession.”

6. First black woman to be Vice President?

A related error took place later in the summer, when Biden appeared to say that he himself was the “first vice president, first black woman to serve with a black president.”

This particular gaffe came after Biden’s disastrous June 27 debate performance, at a point when politicos were starting to wonder if Vice President Kamala Harris — the person Biden was trying to reference — could take his place. Those questions only intensified as the summer progressed.

7. Vice President Trump?

Yet another Vice President-related gaffe came on July 11, when Biden was fighting for his political life.

Holding a “big boy” press conference to reassert confidence in his abilities, the president instead whiffed on his very first response, referencing “Vice President Trump” when he meant to say Harris.

“I wouldn’t have picked Vice President Trump to be vice president if I thought she’s not qualified to be president,” Biden said. “So let’s start here.”

Things did not improve from that point.

8. Too good to be true

Still grasping onto the Democratic nomination on July 16, Biden rolled out a policy proposal that would limit rent increases to 5% a year. Struggling once again to read the teleprompter, he squinted before announcing a different number.

“Look, folks, the idea, the idea that corporate-owned housing is able to raise your rent, [300], 400 bucks a month or something? Well, I’m about to announce that they can’t raise it more than—” Biden said, pausing and leaning forward, “$55.”

While the crowd loved it, the figure was too good to be true — and another Biden blunder.

9. A shot at Trump backfires

Biden finally dropped his reelection bid on July 21 in favor of Harris, at which point the glare of the spotlight diminished significantly. He committed only a small handful of errors during the second half of the year, though they still managed to be impactful in their own way.

The president often criticized Trump for using the term “black jobs,” only to use it himself by accident in mid-September.

“With your help, in just three-and-a-half years we’ve created over 2 million new black jobs for black — black Americans and black,” the president mumbled, pausing amid laughter from the audience.

Trying to recover, he added, “By the way, the next black job to be filled is as president of the United States of America,” turning the laughter into cheers.

10. As does another one

In the final days of the 2024 campaign, Biden undermined his successor’s efforts more than once, perhaps never more prominently than the now-infamous “garbage” gaffe.

Exactly one week before election day and with Harris about to make her closing speech, Biden referred to all Trump supporters as “garbage,” drawing comparisons to Hillary Clinton’s “basket of deplorables” remark.

“The only garbage I see floating out there is his supporters,” Biden said.

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That set off a flurry of events during which the White House altered the official transcript to read “supporter’s,” meaning one person rather than millions of voters, and Democrats quickly distanced themselves from the comment.

But the damage was done, Trump won the election, and the era of Biden gaffes will come to an end at noon on Jan. 20.

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