Democratic presidential nominee Joe Biden once again struggled to speak during an event, falsely claiming that estimates indicate that there would be 200 million people dead from COVID by the time he was done speaking.
Speaking about the issue of health care, the former vice president said, “And perhaps most cruelly of all, if Donald Trump has his way, the complications from COVID-19, which are well beyond what they should be—it’s estimated that 200 million people have died probably by the time I finish this talk—the complications of COVID-19, like lung scarring and heart damage, could become the next deniable preexisting condition for over six million Americans who’ve already contracted the disease.”
Joe Biden: “It’s estimated that 200 million people will die, probably by the time I finish this talk.”
That’s nearly 2/3 of the U.S. population. pic.twitter.com/lp23K11K3o
— Trump War Room (@TrumpWarRoom) September 20, 2020
Less than one million COVID deaths have been recorded globally, and only around 200,000 people have been recorded as having died from the virus in the United States.
Joe Biden did not seem to notice his mistake, which may lend more credence to criticism of his current mental state.
Several minutes later in the speech, Biden said something closer to the actual statistic: “Like I said, as I speak, we’re probably passing 200,000 deaths lost to this virus.”
A spokesperson for the Biden campaign told Fox News that the candidate “misspoke.”
More False Criticism of Trump’s Handling of the Virus
At a CNN town hall last week, Biden claimed: “If the president had done his job, had done his job from the beginning, all the people would still be alive. All the people—I’m not making this up. Just look at the data. Look at the data.”
Even the left-wing Washington Post had to call Biden out on this lie.
Glenn Kessler, a Washington Post fact-checker, wrote:
“Actually, Biden is making this up. There is no data to support this, even if the president had moved rapidly in January to deal with the coronavirus and been able to persuade the Chinese leadership to be more forthcoming about the situation. Even nations that have been praised for their handling of the pandemic, such as South Korea, New Zealand and Iceland, have suffered some deaths (377 in South Korea, 25 in New Zealand and 10 in Iceland).
In the United States, with 50 states run by governors, policies have varied greatly. Trump has been faulted for not articulating a national plan, but he would have had trouble persuading every governor to follow the exact same path.”
Politico called out Joe Biden’s remarks as well, writing that the Democrat nominee “vastly overstated what protections could have worked against the virus,” and that his statements were “not true.”
Biden seems to have a pattern of making confusing statements regarding numbers, including a statement from last year where he claimed that over 100 million Americans had died from gun violence in the previous 12 years.
“150 million people have been killed since 2007 when Bernie voted to exempt the gun manufacturers from liability. More than all the wars, including Vietnam, from that point on, carnage on our streets,” Biden falsely claimed.
Recently, Biden also stated that 6,114 military members have died from COVID, misreading the abbreviation “MI” as military, instead of Michigan, the state he was speaking in. Only seven military members had died from the virus at the time of his speech.
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