Joe Biden called Donald Trump “a loser” during a speech while speaking to a crowd at a Democratic party gala in Hanover, Maryland. The 10-minute talk focused on painting the current President as unfit for the job, vain, and deeply corrupt.
According to The Guardian, Biden spoke at the Live! Casino & Hotel Maryland as part of an effort to help Democrats win back control of Congress in the upcoming midterm elections in November. Biden spent part of his time pointing to what he called vanity projects in Washington DC.
He named the tearing down of the White House East Wing to build a ballroom, the addition of Trump’s name to the John Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts, which was later removed by court order, and plans for a triumphal arch.
Biden links the criticism to ethics complaints and foreign policy
Biden also mentioned the algae bloom that affected the $14.7m renovation of the Lincoln Memorial reflecting pool. This project involved a $1.7m no-bid filtration contract given to a neighbor of the President at his Mar-a-Lago club in Florida.
The speech went beyond complaints about buildings to address what Biden called deeper problems within the administration. He talked about the administration’s efforts to pay people who were convicted for their roles in the January 6, 2021 attack on the US Capitol and were later granted presidential pardons. After laying out these events, Biden said, “Whoa! What a loser.”
The main point of his argument focused on the ethics of the current administration. Biden told the audience, “It’s the corruption, the corruption, the brazen, blatant corruption.” He went on to say, “Corruption on a scale never seen before in American history in any administration.” Biden has faced his own questions over ethics, including a recent move where he sued to block release of audio recordings.
The speech also touched on relations with other countries. Biden criticized the President’s relationship with Vladimir Putin following the 2022 invasion of Ukraine. He also accused the President of the “deliberate distortion and destruction” of the Nato military alliance, which he noted has been strained by the war that the US and Israel started in Iran in late February.
Speaking about the President’s effect on world affairs, Biden, 83, said of Trump, 80, “He’s diminished our standing in the world more than any president in history has.” The remarks came on the two-year anniversary of a televised debate between the two men, which took place before Biden dropped out of the 2024 presidential race. After that withdrawal, Trump defeated Vice-President Kamala Harris to win his second term in the White House.
While Biden took a sharp tone during the gala, he had earlier shared a more standard message about the political situation. In a statement released before the event, he said, “I’ve always believed democracy isn’t a spectator sport.” He used that statement to praise the work of political organizers who spend their time knocking on doors and making phone calls.
The appearance came as members of the Biden family have become more visible in public. Former first lady Jill Biden recently published her memoir, View from the East Wing, on June 2, 2026. During an event for the book, she mentioned that her husband’s cancer diagnosis, which was announced in May 2025, “really puts life into perspective.”
Meanwhile, Hunter Biden has been active on social media, sharing posts about politics, mental health, and his recovery from addiction. This comes after he received a pardon from his father for federal gun and tax charges toward the end of the Biden presidency. Jill Biden later spoke about that decision, defending the pardon of their son Hunter in a CBS interview.
Published: Jun 29, 2026 09:00 am