A Trump staffer attempted to ridicule former vice president and current Democratic presidential nominee Joe Biden as he visited the graves of his deceased family members.
Biden was filmed walking alone, his Secret Service detail behind him, through the cemetery at St. Joseph on the Brandywine Roman Catholic Church. At the time, he was heading through its grounds to where his first wife, Neilia, his young daughter, Naomi, and his son, former Delaware Atty. Gen. Beau Biden, are buried.
A journalist called out to him, but instead of engaging, Biden waved and continued on his way.
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Francis Brennan, the Trump campaign’s director of strategic response, chose to mock the moment, saying Biden was “meandering along” instead of talking to reporters.
Brennan was swiftly dragged on Twitter by media personalities, celebrities and others. Democratic Rep. Eric Swalwell wrote, “It’s a cemetery. Where his son is buried. Are you human?”
Actress Holly Robinson Peete responded to the tweet with a meme that read, “You’re going straight to hell.”
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Others noted that in July, an RNC spokesman mockingly tweeted a decades-old photo of then-Senator Biden and a young Beau, the now-dead child wearing a knit Redskins cap, curled up in his father’s lap.
Another Twitter user questioned how the scene outside the church could even upset the Trump base.
“So much of the criticism of Biden from the Trump campaign, I look at and I can’t understand who it’s appealing to,” Michael David Smith, managing editor of Pro Football Talk, wrote. “Biden politely declined to talk to a reporter while at the cemetery visiting his son’s grave. Which voters will dislike Biden for this?
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Despite the backlash, Brennan did not remove the tweet nor offer any apology.
He is reportedly one of the staffers behind Trump War Room, the president’s often-controversial re-election campaign leadership. In June, social media companies removed ads from the Trump War Room which contained a symbol used by Nazi Germany.
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