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WASHINGTON — President Joe Biden or President Ron Burgundy?
In a scenario reminiscent of fiction coming to life, the president paused during his speech to union members in Washington, D.C., after reading the prompt “pause” from the teleprompter.
“Four more years. Pause,” said Biden, 81, a la Will Ferrell’s buffoonish newsman character in the classic 2004 comedy “Anchorman.”
Members of North America’s Building Trades Unions stepped in and dutifully chanted “four more years” in response to the president’s botched cue.
This incident was just one of the many strange moments that occurred during the speech, with Biden mentioning that his predecessor, Donald Trump, had gifted him a pair of boots.
“The man has never experienced a day of labor in the boots of a working person,” Biden remarked about Trump, who is expected to be his potential opponent in the 2024 election. He then went on to mention, “Oh, by the way, he gave me a pair of boots as a present.”
“I know how to put them on,” the president added. “I still sometimes cut the yard. But the Secret Service doesn’t let me do it anymore.”
It was unclear whether Biden was trying to tell a joke or was relating the latest in a series of dubious anecdotes.
The White House did not immediately respond to requests for comment, nor did the Trump campaign.
Biden attacked the 45th president repeatedly Wednesday, telling union delegates Trump “looks down on us” and was like “the guys you grew up with that you’d like to get into the corner just give them a straight left”
“I’m not suggesting we hit the president,” the Democrat hastened to add.
Elsewhere in his speech, Biden incorrectly claimed “I cut the national debt so far,” when he meant to use the word “deficit” — a repeated gaffe on his part.
The president also invoked his hometown of Scranton, Pa. during the remarks as he attempted to draw a distinction between blue-collar voters and Trump, who will need the group to win back the White House.
At one point, Biden humorously referenced Trump’s 2020 musing about the possibility that disinfectants could be injected to cure COVID-19.
“Remember when he was trying to deal with COVID he suggested injecting a little bleach in your veins? He missed, it all went to his hair,” Biden said.
The president claimed on two occasions last week that cannibals may have eaten his mother’s brother Ambrose Finnegan in 1944 when his military plane crashed during World War II — offending the leaders of Papua New Guinea just a day before Chinese foreign minister Wang Yi arrived to court the nation.
The White House later acknowledged that military records show the plane crashed into the ocean.
