Joe Biden blasted President Trump after former national security adviser John Bolton alleged the commander in chief asked China for help ahead of November’s general election.
“Trump sold out the American people to protect his political future,” Biden said in a statement.
“He was willing to trade away our most cherished democratic values for the empty promise of a flimsy trade deal that bailed him out of his disastrous tariff war that did so much damage to our farmers, manufacturers, and consumers,” the two-term vice president and presumptive 2020 Democratic presidential nominee added.
Biden described the accusation as “morally repugnant” and a violation of Trump’s “sacred duty” to the American people to protect U.S. interests and values, tying his slow response to the COVID-19 outbreak to Bolton’s claim.
“He thought that letting the President of China run the table on us in the long run would give him another term in the short run,” Biden said of Trump. “In exchange, he was willing to stay silent on Hong Kong. In exchange, he condoned interning more than one million Uighurs in concentration camps.”
Warning China to “stay out” of the fall fight, he continued, “Donald Trump’s behavior disgraces the American presidency. We knew that long before today’s revelations.”
In his new book, Bolton alleges that during a one-on-one meeting with Chinese leader Xi Jinping at the June 2019 Group of 20 summit in Japan, Trump “turned the conversation to the coming U.S. presidential election, alluding to China’s economic capability to affect the ongoing campaigns, pleading with Xi to ensure he’d win.”
“He stressed the importance of farmers, and increased Chinese purchases of soybeans and wheat in the electoral outcome. I would print Trump’s exact words but the government’s prepublication review process has decided otherwise,” Bolton writes.
Other members of Trump’s administration have vigorously defended the president. U.S. Trade Representative Robert Lighthizer told the Senate Wednesday Bolton’s allegation was “absolutely untrue.”