Presidential hopeful and former Secretary of Housing and Urban Development Julián Castro came to his own defense after remarking the Democratic front-runner Joe Biden had a lapse in memory during the Thursday night debate in Houston.
“Are you forgetting already what you said just two minutes ago?” the 44-year-old Castro fired at Biden, 76, during a spirited exchange about healthcare during the debate. “I mean, I can’t believe that you said two minutes ago that they had to buy in, and now you’re saying they don’t have to buy — you’re forgetting that.”
Castro’s remarks were widely condemned by media and several people close to the Biden campaign. David Axelrod, a former adviser to President Barack Obama, chided Castro for his remarks during post-debate analysis saying his rebuke of Biden was “ageist.”
“It was such an overt kind of shot … ageist sort of shot at Biden,” Axelrod said of the exchange while remarking that Castro’s debate performance had been underwhelming overall.
Responding to intense criticism for his Thursday remarks about Biden during a Friday morning interview, Castro flatly denied that his comments were meant as an attack on Biden’s age and potential senility. After being asked whether he would do anything differently in retrospect, Castro said he would not. “I wouldn’t do it differently,” he said. “That was not a personal attack.”
Biden has been scrutinized since the launch of his presidential campaign in April for various mistakes he has made during public speeches. Some in the media have questioned his fitness for the arduous campaign process and whether he would be able to serve as commander in chief in light of the myriad of speech errors he has committed over the past several months.
Further pressed about his scathing remarks toward the former vice president, Castro brushed off the assertion that he had actually accused Biden of forgetting his remarks on multiple occasions throughout the debate. “He couldn’t hear me in the auditorium,” Castro said in his defense. “He [Biden] had just denied what he had said two minutes before.”
Castro also said he would challenge any candidate with the same question, regardless of their age.
