The White House said Tuesday President Joe Biden did not have a response to the violence that occurred at the Oscars award ceremony on Sunday, after actor Will Smith punched comedian Chris Rock for making a joke about his wife.
“I don’t have any official comment from the White House on the altercation,” White House communications director Kate Bedingfield told reporters on Tuesday during the daily press briefing, when asked about the televised moment that shocked the world.
Bedingfield said that Biden did not watch the Oscars and “didn’t see it.”
“I don’t have any official comment from him or from the White House on this,” she repeated.
Biden has a history of speaking passionately on violence and assault, even appearing at the Oscars in 2016 with singer and actress Lady Gaga to condemn sexual assault.
“We must and we can change the culture so that no abused woman or man – like the survivors you see here tonight – ever feel like they have to ask themselves, ‘What did I do?’ They did not do anything wrong,” he told the audience of Hollywood’s elite.
But despite his anti-violent advocacy, even Biden fantasized about physically beating up former President Donald Trump in a 2018 speech.
“They asked me if I’d like to debate this gentleman, and I said no. I said, ‘If we were in high school, I’d take him behind the gym and beat the hell out of him.’”
Biden later apologized for his comment in an interview with former Obama staffers on the their Pod Save America podcast.
Joe Biden talks about his "fight" with Donald Trump pic.twitter.com/8vnG38QciD
— Pod Save America (@PodSaveAmerica) March 23, 2018
“I shouldn’t have said what I said … because I don’t want to get down in the mosh pit with this guy,” Biden said.
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