FACT CHECK: Did Joe Biden Send This Tweet Disparaging Minority Communities After His Feb. 16 CNN Town Hall?

Trevor Schakohl | Legal Reporter

An image shared on Facebook purportedly shows a tweet from President Joe Biden addressing a comment he made during a Feb. 16 CNN town hall event.

Verdict: False

There is no record of Biden sending the tweet. The purported tweet has too many characters to be a genuine tweet.

Fact Check:

Biden faced some criticism for remarks he made during a Feb. 16 CNN town hall event in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, hosted by Anderson Cooper regarding registration for the COVID-19 vaccine and the racial disparities in health care that have been exacerbated by the disease.

“Not everybody in the community – in the Hispanic and the African American community, particularly in rural areas that are distant and/or inner city districts – know how to use —  know how to get online to determine how to get in line for that COVID vaccination at the Walgreens or at the particular store,” Biden said, according to a transcript on the White House website. “So, we’re also – I’ve committed to spend a billion dollars on public education to help people figure out how they can get in there. That’s why we’re also trying to set up mass vaccination centers, like places in stadiums and the like.”

Following the comments, social media users shared an image that purportedly shows a tweet sent by Biden on Feb. 18. The alleged tweet attempts to explain that Biden’s remarks during the town hall had been “taken out of context.”

“My comment regarding minorities not being able to use the internet was taken out of context,” the purported tweet reads. “It’s not they don’t know how to use it it’s just that they don’t know any better. Those people don’t know about computers because they lack the resources, education and their overall commitment in their communities. It’s not that they’re dumb it’s just they don’t like to do anything. Hope this clears that up.”

The tweet, however, is not genuine. Check Your Fact searched both of Biden’s verified Twitter accounts but found no instances of the tweet. Nor could the remark be found in ProPublica’s archive of his deleted tweets.

The statement doesn’t appear in Biden’s other social media posts or on the White House website either. Had Biden sent the tweet, it almost certainly would have made headlines, yet no media outlets have reported on it. (RELATED: Did Joe Biden ‘Quietly’ Pardon 2,617 Black Lives Matter Protesters?)

The tweet appears to have been fabricated. It contains over 350 characters, surpassing Twitter’s current limit of 280 characters per tweet.

Trevor Schakohl

Legal Reporter
Follow Trevor on Twitterhttps://twitter.com/tschakohl

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