Hunter Biden says Joe Biden was taking Ambien before disastrous debate against Trump
Hunter Biden also used several expletives to criticize George Clooney and other prominent Democrats who publicly called for then-President Biden to leave the 2024 White House race.
WASHINGTON − Hunter Biden, son of former President Joe Biden, says his father was taking the sleep medication Ambien before his disastrous debate with Donald Trump that led to Joe Biden ending his 2024 reelection bid amid pressure from top Democrats.
Hunter Biden raised the president's use of Ambien, which had not been reported, during a more than three-hour interview on the YouTube show Channel 5 with Andrew Callaghan on July 21.
The former president's son also unleashed expletive-laced attacks targeting actor George Clooney, Democratic strategists James Carville and David Axelrod, and other prominent Democrats who publicly called for Biden to drop out of the race after the debate.
"I know exactly what happened in that debate," Hunter Biden said in the interview. "He flew around the world ‒ basically the mileage that he could have flown around the world three times. He's 81 years old. He's tired as s--t. They give him Ambien to be able to sleep. He gets up on the stage, and he looks like he's a deer in the headlights, and it feeds into every f---ing story that anybody wants to tell."
Ambien, also known by its generic name, zolpidem, is used to treat insomnia by helping users fall asleep quicker and stay asleep.
Joe Biden, now 82, and his former White House aides have blamed the president's particularly busy schedule that stretch for his poor debate performance on June 27, 2024, but have not publicly mentioned the use of Ambien.
A spokeswoman for the former president declined to comment when asked about Hunter Biden's remarks.
In his lone debate with Trump in 2024, then-President Biden struggled to complete his thoughts, fumbled over words and made several embarrassing gaffes. Over the next several days and weeks, Democratic lawmakers and other party insiders pushed Biden to withdraw from the race despite his insistence he wasn't stepping down. Biden ultimately dropped out and endorsed his vice president, Kamala Harris, as the Democratic nominee less than four weeks later on July 21, 2024.
Hunter Biden rips George Clooney, Democrats who doubted dad
In the lengthy interview that aired July 21 on YouTube, Hunter Biden ripped Clooney, a prominent Hollywood donor for Democrats who wrote a New York Times op-ed last year urging Biden to withdraw over concerns about his age and fitness.
"What do you have to do with anything?" Hunter Biden said, referring to Clooney, as he dismissed the star as a "brand" and not an actor.
Of Carville, Hunter Biden criticized the longtime Democratic operative, who also had called for Joe Biden to drop out, as someone who "hasn't won a race" in 40 years.
The president's son then hit Axelrod, who had raised questions about Joe Biden's age long before the disastrous debate with Trump, and former Biden White House adviser Anita Dunn, accusing her of making "$40 million to $50 million" off the Democratic Party.
Dunn, unlike Hunter Biden's other targets, was a key member of Joe Biden's inner circle and never called on the president to drop out.
Leading up to the debate, Joe Biden had returned to Europe for a G-7 summit in Italy after being in France for an event days earlier honoring Allied veterans in France on the 80th anniversary of D-Day. In between the European trips, Biden swung back to the United States to be at home in Wilmington, Delaware, for the verdict of Hunter Biden's guns case trial.
Upon returning to the United States from Italy, Joe Biden then flew across the country to a star-studded fundraiser in Los Angeles co-hosted by Clooney and actress Julia Roberts. The president then flew to the Camp David presidential retreat in Maryland, where he spent six days preparing for the debate with top advisers.
Before departing the White House, Joe Biden in December 2024 issued a full and unconditional pardon that cleared Hunter Biden of three federal gun felonies and federal tax charges. The broadly worded pardon also gave the president's son a blanket reprieve for any other crimes “he committed or may have committed" between Jan. 1, 2014, and the end of 2024.
Reach Joey Garrison on X @joeygarrison.