Former President Joe Biden has issued scathing criticism of President Donald Trump in his upcoming memoir, saying his actions during the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the Capitol “should follow him to his grave.”
Biden’s comments, published Monday as book excerpts in The Atlantic, constitute one of his most vocal criticisms of Trump since the former president left office.
In the excerpt, Biden claims Trump “led an insurrection” and criticized his decision to grant a sweeping pardon to the Jan. 6 defendants.
“The criminals who attacked law enforcement that day did not deserve a pardon,” Biden wrote. “They deserved prison time.”
The former president added that Trump and his supporters “continue to brag and behave as if they are supporters of law enforcement.”
“Here’s my point: You can’t turn a blind eye to cops getting punched, speared, sprayed and brutalized and consider yourself a friend of law enforcement,” he wrote. “What Trump did on January 6, 2021 must never be forgotten. It must follow him to his grave.”
Reached for comment, White House spokeswoman Lauren Bis called Biden “the worst president in American history.” She highlighted his management of the border, crime and inflation, adding: “What they did to this country should never be forgotten.” »
The memoir, “Promise Me, America,” is set to be released Nov. 17.
In an interview with Time magazine in September, Trump acknowledged that he was considering pardoning members of his administration before the end of his term, highlighting Biden’s decision to issue preemptive pardons.
Biden issued the pardons to his son, Hunter Biden, and other members of his family, to lawmakers on the Congressional Jan. 6 Committee, Dr. Anthony Fauci, and to former Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Mark Milley.
Biden also described meeting with Trump after the 2024 election, part of a tradition where the outgoing president briefs the incoming president.
Biden said Trump’s tone “bordered on flattery” and said Trump told him that “if it weren’t for politics, I believe we would be good friends” — a remark the former president said left him “too stunned to respond.”
“He said my job creation performance had been ‘extraordinary,’” Biden wrote. “He added that he was relieved not to have to run against me. I didn’t really understand why he was buttering me up, so I cut off his compliments and got down to business.”
During the roughly two-hour meeting, Biden said he wanted to give Trump insight into global issues that he said would “dominate his presidency.”
“He nodded appreciatively,” Biden said of Trump. “But I noticed a curious trend: He focused on the personalities of leaders, as if we were sharing gossip about people at a dinner party, without discussing issues of global importance.”
Biden announced Sunday that he “couldn’t do as much talking about my book as I hoped,” noting his battle with cancer.
“Some days are better than others,” Biden said in the message to X. “That hasn’t stopped me. But sometimes it slows me down.”
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