In his first interview since the 2024 election, Hunter Biden said Democrats lost the race because they failed to stay “loyal” to his father, then-president Joe Biden—claiming that the party “literally melted down” despite what he called his father’s “incredibly successful” presidency.
“We lost the last election because we did not remain loyal to the leader of the party,” Hunter Biden told former Democratic National Committee chairman Jaime Harrison on a podcast set to debut Thursday, according to the Washington Post.
“That’s my position,” Biden went on. “We had the advantage of incumbency, we had the advantage of an incredibly successful administration, and the Democratic Party literally melted down.”
Biden, who has a long history of alcohol and drug addictions, has been no stranger to controversy over the years. The former first son was convicted of three felonies involving a gun purchase and later pleaded guilty to felony and misdemeanor charges for failing to pay more than $1.4 million in federal taxes from 2016 to 2019. Joe Biden pardoned his son in December 2024, just weeks before leaving office.
Hunter Biden also denied the existence of a “grand conspiracy” to cover up his father’s mental and physical decline, according to the Post. Recent books and media reports have painted a grim picture of Joe Biden’s health during the election, with former chief of staff Ron Klain revealing to author Chris Whipple that the then-president was “extremely exhausted” and “unaware of what was happening in his own campaign.” Whipple also said that Biden wandered off and fell asleep by the pool during one of Klain’s debate prep sessions.
Former White House physician Kevin O’Connor, who gave Biden clean bills of health throughout the former president’s term, refused to testify last week in a congressional hearing on Biden’s health.
Biden dropped out of the race last July after his disastrous debate performance against then-Republican nominee Donald Trump triggered widespread backlash, including from fellow Democrats. His vice president, Kamala Harris, took over the Democratic nomination but went on to lose to Trump, failing to carry a single swing state.
The defeat quickly plunged the Democratic Party into infighting and public finger-pointing. Some Democrats believed Joe Biden would have been a stronger nominee than Harris, while others, including former House speaker Nancy Pelosi, argued that Harris might have performed better had Biden withdrawn from the race sooner.