NY Times: Chuck Schumer Knew Joe Biden Had Memory Issues Before His Disastrous Debate
“During their weekly conversations, the president often rambled, but he had always rambled. Once in a while, Mr. Biden would forget why he had called, but Mr. Schumer thought little of it.”

As Legal Insurrection previously reported, two weeks ago Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-NY) sat down for an interview on “Meet the Press” where he denied that Democrats, including himself, ever misled the American people about President Joe Biden’s apparent mental decline.
Here’s how the exchange between Schumer and moderator Kristen Welker went down:
KRISTEN WELKER: Leader Schumer, what do you say to Americans who feel as though you and other top Democrats misled them about President Biden’s mental acuity?
SEN. CHUCK SCHUMER: No. Look, we didn’t. And let’s – let’s look – let’s look at President Biden. He’s had an amazing record. The legislation we passed, one of the most significant groups of legislation since the New Deal – since Lyndon Johnson’s Great Society, putting in 235 judges, a record. And he’s a patriot. He’s a great guy.
[…]
KRISTEN WELKER: Do you feel, as we have this conversation today, that President Biden could serve another four years, had he stayed in the race and potentially won?
SEN. CHUCK SCHUMER: Well, I’m not going to speculate. As I said, I think his record is a stellar one. And he’ll go down in history as a really outstanding president.
Note the piling on of the praise along with the dodging and weaving in the answers, as Schumer was and is still very reluctant to admit publicly to what most of us know at this point about Biden.
I suspect a big reason for that is the critical role he admittedly played in getting Biden to drop out of the presidential race just three weeks after the infamous June 2024 debate between the POTUS and then-presumptive GOP presidential nominee Donald Trump.
Schumer, in a detailed New York Times write-up published just days before Biden’s sole term in office ends, admitted his role in the situation. He recalled that his back was up against the wall with the Senate Democrat Caucus. Senate Democrats privately warned him they would publicly call for Biden to exit the race if he didn’t announce his decision soon
Some of them even wondered if it was Biden they were communicating with after receiving a letter after the Independence Day holiday break telling them, in a nutshell, it was time to fall in line:
Democrats on Capitol Hill seethed. In a closed-door lunch the next day, senators said the president was being selfish. They questioned whether he had even written the letter himself, or whether his aides or maybe even his son Hunter had written it for him.
In another meeting a few days later, things got worse, with some Democrat Senators demanding a sign-off from two neurologists who would say that Biden was okay:
The July 11 meeting was grim. Democratic senators, even normally reserved ones who were close with Mr. Biden, erupted. The usually quiet Senator Jack Reed of Rhode Island, a West Point graduate and former paratrooper, said he could no longer support his commander in chief unless Mr. Biden could produce two neurologists to issue a public report saying he was fit to serve, and then hold a news conference where anyone could ask questions.
Senator Sheldon Whitehouse of Rhode Island told Mr. Biden’s aides that the silence from the majority of Democratic senators should not be interpreted as a sign of support. It was out of respect and affection to allow Mr. Biden time to gracefully exit the race, but it would not last forever, he said, because if they continued to vouch for his fitness, they would be “lying.”
This isn’t how people react if they believe a bad performance was a one-off. This is how they react when they know the problems are part of a pattern that they undoubtedly witnessed many times before.
What was perhaps most illuminating about the Times report beyond the Democrat Senators tacitly admitting they knew Biden’s poor performance at the debate was more than just a mere bad night were three things.
For starters, there was Schumer’s roundabout admission that he knew Biden had memory issues before the debate:
For months, Mr. Schumer had been concerned that Mr. Biden was going to lose to Mr. Trump and cost Democrats Congress. It wasn’t that he thought Mr. Biden was not capable of the job. During their weekly conversations, the president often rambled, but he had always rambled. Once in a while, Mr. Biden would forget why he had called, but Mr. Schumer thought little of it. He was convinced that Mr. Biden could handle the job.
Then there were the only two questions Biden asked Schumer at their meeting at Biden’s Rehoboth Beach home on July 13th: “Do you really think Kamala can win?” Clearly, there was doubt.
Lastly, there was the confirmation that former President Barack Obama’s role in getting the ball rolling was extensive. In fact, it was Obama who urged Schumer to meet with Biden since Obama believed Biden was still harboring a grudge over Obama’s support for Hillary Clinton’s 2016 presidential campaign:
As days ticked by, Mr. Obama worried that Democrats were doing nothing. He told Mr. Schumer that he himself had a fragile relationship with his former vice president, who still carried a chip on his shoulder over Mr. Obama’s decision to support Hillary Clinton’s candidacy in 2016. Having urged him not to run back then, Mr. Obama told Mr. Schumer, he wasn’t sure if he was the best messenger to tell Mr. Biden to step aside now.
What it all boils down to is that they all knew, but stayed quiet about it until Biden’s debate performance forced their hand. The cover-up remains one of the biggest scandals in presidential history, and I eagerly await any forthcoming tell-alls that hopefully will dive into who knew what and when – complete with receipts.
-Stacey Matthews has also written under the pseudonym “Sister Toldjah” and can be reached via Twitter/X.-

Donations tax deductible
to the full extent allowed by law.
Comments
Older people in decline go in and out of cognizance. Anyone who saw slo Joe frequently knew he was NOT able to preside over the country, but all of them were so arrogant!
With the MSM behind them, modern drugs and control of how infrequently he had to appear, they were sure they could hold the rest of us in abeyance. UNTIL that debate. What went wrong for them wlll probably never be known but it probably was a bad day and no drug could have made a difference.
After his debate with Trump, they could no longer cover their bases!
We learn two things:
1. Things we should know are kept a secret.
2. Things that are a secret are released anonymously.
Wait, didn’t the NYT know? Didn’t every Democrat?
Yes, yes, they did every single time they covered for him, and they just lied about it for four freaking years.
This is the finger-pointing stage. They are all guilty, guilty, guilty.
Chuck is many things (most of them negative), but he isn’t clueless. Most people here recognized Joe’s cognitive problems during the 2020 campaign, and realized the Dems were using Covid as an excuse to hide him in his basement. Schumer certainly knew even then that Joe was already too far gone to be an effective leader. But that was just fine with them, because getting Joe elected would allow other Dems to actually run the show, allowing them to exercise more authority than their due by using Joe as front man.
Most 2020 Biden voters recognized that Joe was senile too, but they were gaslighted by the Media enough to rationalize that he wasn’t that bad or that Trump was worse.
Oh please, anyone who is honest KNEW the guy was in an advanced stage of cognitive decline BEFORE the 202 election. Anyone who ways otherwise is either a complete idiot of a fu*king liar, or both.
Joe is the only one who didn’t know.
The entire issue can be covered by understanding that they (the Uniparty and their propaganda arm) have always lied to us and will continue to lie.
To assume that any one of them would now tell the truth is below moronic; THIS time the fire won’t burn me.
Schumer has his own age-related cognitive issues. He is, after all, one of the leaders of our gerontocracy.
Every left knew but a figurehead is a figurehead and much of the radical agenda could be forced.
Joe: I could’ve beat Trump if I had ran.
Paula: How do you figure that?
Joe: Because Kamala picked that stupid Walz for VP, but I picked a much smarter person for VP.
Frankly, BFD. They all knew, everyone knew.
News flash!!!!:
Water is wet.
Notice that the discussions all centered around power and their fear of losing it, not of serving their constituents or the American people or even genuine concern for Mr. Biden’s health.
Mr. Schumer’s departure from public life will be cause for great celebration.
LOL.
EVERYBODY knew.
And Traitor Joe was always known to be a moron, from his earliest days in Washington. Some magazine ranked the IQs of Senators back in the 70s and put Biden last, which is why he always challenges people that he has a higher IQ. It’s laughable.
The big question concerning Biden is, “Why has the intelligence apparatus been working to defend him and his obvious criminality for all those years – from back when he was a nothing Senator??” Biden has enjoyed intelligence agencies defending him (and attacking his enemies) for decades, and for no obvious reason. They don’t do that for many Senators (I can’t even think of another, frankly) and Biden was never even much of a Senator. Something much more rotten has been going on. Worse than even Biden’s harshest critics have suspected.
“Once in a while, Mr. Biden would forget why he had called, but Mr. Schumer thought little of it.”
Clearly, Mr. Schumer didn’t think at all.
Or he thought little of Biden and didn’t care that he was a babbling fool.
Here’s the thing: most people knew that Joe wasn’t ever the sharpest knife in the drawer, and knew that he was getting duller by the day. BUT- many people thought that was a positive, not a negative. Most were tired of the daily drama from the Left over Trump, and thought four nice dull years with nothing interesting happening would be nice.
However, everyone who had that thought expected the Democrats to appoint a boring and conservative (for Democrats, anyhow) group to govern. Instead the radical left wing was given control of ….everything. The military, the space program, oil policy, immigration policy, and foreign policy.
We must get people to remember this in four years. It was NEVER Joe; it was ALWAYS the new Democratic party.
The proper conclusion since Schumer really now believes in Biden‘s decline is to 25th amendment him. Of course there’s almost no time left in Biden’s tenure and I DO NOT want Harris to be president even for 1hour.
Only in an alternate universe.
On second thought, in no universe.
“Outstanding,” as in a cactus spine.
Schumer is Chuck Full of Bull Crab.
“NY Times: Chuck Schumer Knew Joe Biden Had Memory Issues”
Well, of COURSE he did.
Schumer isn’t stupid, he’s just a stone cold liar.
And a vicious vindictive apparatchik willing to let the “Intelligence Community” loose on Trump – six ways to Sunday.
There is no doubt in my mind that Schumer hates the country, and that he cares only for Democrats Party power.
I struggle to understand their— the puppet masters’— thought processes. As of 2022, when Trump announced his reelection intentions, it was clear that propping up their pretend POTUS, was becoming increasingly difficult. In addition Joe’s approval ratings had been abysmal since August of 2021. Clearly there is and was division between the actual puppet masters and Joe’s “inner circle” who were pushing for his re-election. Did the puppet masters actually believe that they could pull off the charade for six more years— the completion of his current term and then a second term? Why not use their “powers of persuasion” back then when the D’s could have fielded a much better candidate?
They did not want an effective President. They wanted a puppet, and they overestimated their ability to fool the voters.