A group of hecklers have disrupted a Joe Biden campaign rally in New Hampshire, calling him a ‘pervert’ and chanting ‘Quid Pro Joe.’
The 2020 presidential hopeful shouted back, ‘This is not a Trump rally,’ as he sought to bring order to the event in Milford on Sunday night.
One of the hecklers then claimed he wasn’t a Trump supporter as he shrieked back: ‘Don’t touch kids, you pervert!’
Biden seemed to shrug off the allegation before engaging with those chanting ‘Quid Pro Joe,’ unwilling to allow the slur about his links to Ukraine.
Joe Biden called back, ‘This is not a Trump rally,’ as he sought to bring order to the event in Milford, New Hampshire, on Sunday night
‘I’ve released 21 years of my tax returns, how many has yours? What’s he hiding?’ Biden shouted back at the heckler.
They had appeared to reference the former Vice Presidents’ ties to eastern Europe, as referenced by President Donald Trump’s July 25 phone call to President Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky.
The accusation leveled by Trump, that Biden had threatened to cut off loan guarantees unless the Ukraine replace its prosecutor general in 2016, is currently at the center of the ongoing impeachment scandal.
He has also been forced to address claims of unwanted contact with women in the past.
Earlier this year he said: ‘Social norms have begun to change. They’ve shifted. The boundaries of protecting personal space have been reset, and I get it. I get it. I hear what they’re saying. I’ll be much more mindful.’
Biden’s ferocious encounter in New Hampshire come as he seeks to overtake Bernie Sanders and Pete Buttgieg, who he currently trails in the state, according to RealClearPolitics.
He appeared to attempt an appeal to the center-left of the party on Saturday, saying he would consider nominating former President Barack Obama to the US Supreme Court.
Joe Biden, the front runner for the 2020 Democratic nomination, appeared at a campaign event in Washington, Iowa, on Saturday (left). When asked if he would nominate former president Barack Obama (right) to the Supreme Court, Biden said: ‘If he’d take it, yes’
An attendee asked if he would nominate Obama to sit on the highest court in the country at an event in Washington, Iowa.
In response, Biden replied: ‘If he’d take it, yes.’
If Obama is nominated – and confirmed by the Senate – it would make him only the second president ever to sit as a justice on the Supreme Court.
The first, and only, person to do so is William Howard Taft who served as president from 1909 to 1913.
In 1921, President Warren Harding appointed Taft as the 10th chief justice. He resigned in February 1930 due to his declining health and died the following month.
Earlier Biden said there would be ‘no legal basis’ for Republicans to subpoena his testimony in Trump’s impeachment trial, clarifying remarks from Friday that drew criticism.
Trump was impeached after a July 25 phone call to Ukraine’s President Volodymyr Zelenskiy in which he asked for help investigating Biden.
If that occurred, Obama would be only the second president to ever serve on the Supreme Court, along with William Howard Taft. Pictured: Obama (right) and Biden on stage at the Democratic National Convention 2008 in Denver, Colorado, August 2008
‘I want to clarify something I said yesterday. In my 40 years in public life, I have always complied with a lawful order and in my eight years as VP, my office – unlike Donald Trump and Mike Pence – cooperated with legitimate congressional oversight requests,’ Biden said on Twitter.
‘But I am just not going to pretend that there is any legal basis for Republican subpoenas for my testimony in the impeachment trial,’ Biden added.
The former vice president tweeted that subpoenas should ‘go to witnesses with testimony to offer to Trump’s shaking down the Ukraine government – they should go to the White House.’
Trump and fellow Republicans want to call Biden and his son, Hunter, to appear as witnesses during the proceedings for alleged corruption in Ukraine.
But speaking to the editorial board of The Des Moines Register, Biden, the current front runner for the 2020 Democratic nomination, said that compliance with a subpoena would detract from the president’s own actions.
Biden has not yet been endorsed by his former running mate. Pictured: Obama (right) speaks as Biden (left) stands in the Rose Garden at the White House, November 2016
Biden similarly told reporters during a campaign stop in Iowa on his ‘No Malarkey Tour’ that he wouldn’t appear voluntarily, because he doesn’t want to take the attention away from Trump’s ‘crimes’.
The 77-year-old insisted: ‘No, I’m not going to let them take their eye off the ball.
‘The President is the one who has committed impeachable crimes, and I’m not going to let him divert from that. I’m not going to let anyone divert from that’.
He did not address how he would respond to a subpoena until Friday.
‘This is all about a diversion’, Biden told the editorial board when asked about compliance with a subpoena.
‘And we play his game all the time. He’s done it his whole career.’