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 hasn’t previously been reported, during a more than three-hour interview on the YouTube show Channel 5 with Andrew Callaghan that aired 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.
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“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 individuals fall asleep quicker and stay asleep.
Joe Biden, now 82, and his former White House aides have previously blamed the president’s particularly busy schedule that stretch for his poor June 27, 2024 debate performance but have not publicly mentioned the use of Ambien.
A spokeswoman for the former president did not respond to a request by USA TODAY when asked about Hunter Biden’s remarks about the sleeping drug.
During his lone 2024 debate with Trump, then-President Biden struggled to finish complete 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 election 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 with his age and fitness.
“F— him and everybody around him” Hunter Biden said, dismissing Clooney as “a brand,” not an actor who has a mansion in Lake Como, Italy and is friends with Barack Obama. “What do you have to do with anything? Why do I have to f—ing listen to you? What right do you have to step on a man who’s given 52 years of his f—ing life to the service of this country?”
Hunter Biden said Carville, a longtime Democratic operative also called for Joe Biden to drop out, “hasn’t won a race in 40 f—ing years.”
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The president’s son then hit Axelrod, who raised questions about Joe Biden’s age long before the disastrous debate with Trump. “David Axelrod ‒ who had one success in his political life and that was Barack Obama. That was because of Barack Obama, not because of David f—ing Axelrod,” Hunter Biden said.
Hunter Biden also sounded off on former Biden White House adviser Anita Dunn, accusing her of making “$40 million to $50 million” off the Democratic Party and the former Biden aides who run the liberal podcast, Pod Save America. Hunter Biden said the Pod Save America hosts are “junior f—ing speechwriters” for Obama’s Senate staff who made “millions” on their ties with Obama.
Dunn, unlike Hunter Biden’s other targets, was a key member of Joe Biden’s inner circle and never called on the persident to drop out of the race.
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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 U.S. 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.
This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: Hunter Biden says Joe Biden was taking Ambien before Trump debate
