Former Representative Val Demings (D-Fla.) expressed surprise at the timing of former first lady Jill Biden’s recent interview describing her husband’s health scare, saying she was taken aback that the revelations came nearly 18 months after the Bidens left the White House. Speaking on NBC News’s Meet the Press, Demings questioned why Jill Biden waited so long to disclose that she thought President Joe Biden might have been having a stroke during his disastrous June 2024 debate against Donald Trump.
“I was surprised at the timing from the former first lady,” Demings told host Kristen Welker. “But the bottom line is, I believe that it was something — you know, a lot of people are asking, ‘Why would she do it now?’ I think it was something that was very heavy on her heart because of the attention that it received. It involves her husband.”
Demings drew a parallel between Jill Biden’s decision to speak out and former first lady Melania Trump’s denial of any ties to convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein, arguing that both women felt compelled to address matters that weighed heavily on them personally. “She spoke out because it was something heavy on her heart that she wanted to talk about,” Demings said, adding that she believed Jill Biden when she described being terrified that Joe Biden had suffered a stroke during the debate.
“She’s not in cabinet meetings with him,” Demings noted. “And I think she needed to do this for her own satisfaction and to try to move forward.”
In her full interview with CBS News’s Rita Braver, released Sunday, Jill Biden said she was “frightened, because I had never ever seen Joe like that before or since, never.” She acknowledged that her husband had been “slowing down” during his term but insisted that “the essence of the same Joe Biden” remained. “He was getting older,” she told Braver. “It’s a very intense job. I think it ages you, quickly. Look at the other presidents, I mean, in comparison when they started in office and got out of office. It was natural aging.”
The former president ultimately abandoned his reelection bid after the debate and endorsed then-Vice President Kamala Harris, who lost to Trump in the fall. Questions about Biden’s health and cognitive fitness had dogged him throughout his presidency, intensifying sharply after the debate. The timing of Jill Biden’s remarks has fueled a new round of internal Democratic debate about what the party’s leaders knew and when, as well as whether the Bidens’ handling of the situation damaged the party’s chances. A related internal Democratic feud over the 2024 legacy has already been simmering since Jill Biden’s memoir tour began.
Michael LaRosa, a former spokesperson for Jill Biden, told CNN on Sunday that the interview has undermined the former first lady’s credibility, forcing Americans to ask “was she telling the truth then or is she telling the truth now?” LaRosa accused the Bidens of acting selfishly by “dropping out and leaving the ticket high and dry after he’d been running for reelection for over a year,” calling it “unprecedented and very historic in terms of a political campaign selfishness for their own party.”
LaRosa’s critique echoes broader credibility questions raised by the former spokesperson during her memoir tour. Demings, however, declined to judge Jill Biden harshly, saying she understood the personal weight of the decision. Still, the episode has reopened old wounds within the Democratic Party, as some see the Bidens’ post-presidential disclosures as an attempt to shape their legacy at the expense of the party’s electoral prospects.
