During a September 2024 memorial event marking the 23rd anniversary of the September 11 attacks, Joe Biden was captured on video briefly wearing a red Trump campaign hat, a moment that reportedly marked the end of his joint public appearances with Vice President Kamala Harris ahead of the election.
The event took place in Shanksville, Pennsylvania, where Biden had been meeting with first responders.
During the visit, Biden engaged with a Trump supporter and, in what the White House at the time described as a “gesture of unity,” placed the Trump-branded cap on his head while speaking with the individual.
Footage from the event shows Biden interacting casually with the group before briefly wearing the red cap, which bore Donald Trump’s campaign branding.
While the White House downplayed the moment as a bipartisan gesture, new details published in the book Original Sin: President Biden’s Decline, Its Cover-up, and His Disastrous Choice to Run Again suggest the episode caused internal tension within the administration—particularly with Vice President Kamala Harris.
According to the book, Harris was deeply frustrated by the incident. Upon seeing the footage of Biden wearing the hat, she reportedly turned to her team and asked, “What is he doing?”
She continued, “This is completely unhelpful. And so unnecessary.”
The book asserts that this moment was the final time Harris appeared alongside Biden at a public event before the 2024 election.
The Trump campaign quickly seized on the incident, circulating the footage and mocking the optics of the moment.
“Kamala did so bad in last night’s debate, Joe Biden just put on a Trump hat,” the campaign posted on social media.
Another post from the campaign added, “Thanks for the support, Joe!”
The 9/11 memorial in Shanksville was one of several high-profile appearances Biden made in September 2024, as public scrutiny over his cognitive and physical fitness intensified following a series of on-camera stumbles and media reports questioning his capacity to continue his reelection campaign.
The event, meant to mark a solemn national anniversary, ended up becoming part of the broader political narrative surrounding the campaign.
Original Sin, authored by CNN anchor Jake Tapper and Axios reporter Alex Thompson, has drawn attention for its detailed account of the Biden White House in the months leading up to the 2024 election.
The book highlights numerous behind-the-scenes incidents that reportedly contributed to internal disagreements among senior staff and campaign figures, with the 9/11 event cited as a flashpoint between Biden and Harris.
The White House has not publicly responded to the new claims made in the book.
As of now, there has been no official comment from either Harris or Biden’s post-presidency office on the reported fallout from the event.
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