Texas Republican Rep. Ronny Jackson, a former White House physician, suggested Sunday that President Joe Biden should undergo drug testing immediately before and after Thursday’s presidential debate.
“I will demand, on behalf of many millions of concerned Americans right now, that he submit to a drug test before and after this debate, specifically looking for performance-enhancing drugs,” Jackson told Fox News.
Former President Donald Trump made similar comments during a rally in Philadelphia about Biden using drugs to enhance his debate performance.
“So right before the debate, he gets shot in the ass and that’s…they want to toughen him up. Then he leaves, he leaves – OK. I say he’s going to leave all excited, right? Trump told supporters at the rally.
Asked to comment on Jackson’s allegations, a White House spokesperson pointed out a May statement from spokesman Andres Bates, who told Politico at the time: “It’s telling that Republican officials can’t stop announcing how intimidated they remain by [the] President’s Performance on the State of the Union.”
Bates added: “But after losing every public and private negotiation with President Biden — and after seeing him succeed where they failed on every aspect, from rebuilding America’s infrastructure to reducing violent crime and overcoming competition with China – he tracks that these same Republican officials confuse trust with a drug.”
Unfounded accusations that Biden used performance-enhancing drugs dovetailed with attacks on the president’s age and mental fitness as he seeks another term at age 81. Trump, who just turned 78, has also faced questions about his cognitive abilities, including when he misidentified Jackson as “Ronny Johnson” at a rally last weekend.
Asked by CNN last week about Trump’s false accusations that Biden was on drugs, Biden campaign co-chair Mitch Landrieu referred to the “Ronny Johnson incident.”
“The other day, you may remember, he was trying to question our president’s mental acuity and he couldn’t remember the name of his own doctor, so tell President Trump: bring everything he has,” Landrieu said.
This isn’t the first time the idea of drug testing has come up around a presidential debate. In 2020, before one of the general election debates, Trump said he would be willing to take a drug test and “I think [Biden] you should too.”
In October 2016, Trump also expressed a willingness to take a drug test before a presidential debate and asked then-Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton to do the same.
Jackson, a close Trump ally, has faced his share of scrutiny over his behavior in the White House. He joined the White House medical team during the George W. Bush administration and served as White House physician under Barack Obama and Trump.
In 2018, Jackson withdrew his nomination to head the Department of Veterans Affairs after allegations surfaced that he sometimes got drunk on duty and that he was known as the “candy man” among employees for distributing prescription medications without paperwork.
At the time, Jackson called these allegations “completely false and fabricated.”
A separate 2021 report by a Pentagon inspector general alleged misconduct by Jackson, including abusive behavior and sexual harassment of subordinates. Jackson denied these allegations.
This story originally appeared on NBCNews.com read the full story
