(DailyVantage.com) – US President Joe Biden was criticized on March 27 after he opened a press conference following a deadly school shooting in Nashville, Tennessee with jokes about chocolate chip ice cream.
Following news of the shooting at Covenant School, which killed six people including three children, President Biden held a Women’s Business Summit press conference where he was expected to address the deadly shooting. However, instead of opening the conference with condolences or a statement on the incident, Biden cracked a series of jokes.
Biden began by introducing himself jokingly as “Dr. Jill Biden’s husband,” before declaring that he was a big fan of Jeni’s chocolate chip ice cream. Biden then joked that he only came down to the conference because he “heard there was chocolate chip ice cream,” and added that he had a refrigerator full of ice cream waiting for him upstairs.
While the audience laughed at Biden’s jokes, other Americans were less pleased.
The remarks left the hosts of Fox News — who were watching the conference live — in awe, with co-host Sandra Smith cutting Biden’s speech to express shock and bewilderment at the insensitivity of the remarks considering six people had just been killed.
Co-host John Roberts also weighed in, saying he had expected Biden to be “somber” from the get-go.
In a post on Twitter, Fox News host Mark Levin called Biden’s remarks “sick”, while former MEP and UK Brexit Party leader Nigel Farage suggested the jokes showed Biden was unfit for office.
Minutes after making the ice cream remarks, Biden formally addressed the school shooting, announcing that several children had died and calling for a ban against assault rifles.
Supporters of Biden argued that since the conference was for the Women’s Business Summit, and not specifically in response to the shooting, Biden should not have been expected to open the conference in a somber manner.
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