US President Joe Biden was filmed trying on one of Donald Trump’s campaign hats at a 9/11 memorial event in Pennsylvania on Wednesday. The White House said that Biden wore his two-time opponent’s headgear in a gesture of “bipartisan unity.”
Biden met with firefighters in Shanksville, Pennsylvania, near where United Airlines flight 93 crashed when its hijackers were overpowered by passengers on September 11, 2001. The crowd in the fire station heckled Biden, with one man asking the president “do you remember your name?” as Biden autographed a hat.
“You’re an old fart,” the man said to Biden, before the president responded “Yeah, I’m an old guy...You would know a lot about that.”
Biden then took the man’s ‘Trump 2024’ hat and placed it on top of his own, eliciting cheers from the pro-Trump crowd.
“I’m proud of you now,” the man said to Biden, as the two shook hands.
The White House press pool was not invited into the fire station, and until a video of the encounter was posted on social media, the only images of the visit that made it online were a photograph and a short video of a smiling Biden wearing the Trump hat.
Both were eagerly shared by the Trump campaign and conservative influencers. “Kamala did so bad in last night’s debate, Joe Biden just put on a Trump hat,” the campaign’s ‘Trump War Room’ account posted on X.
“Maybe Trump was on to something last night when he said Joe really hates Kamala?” Republican filmmaker Robby Starbuck wrote.
Vice President Kamala Harris succeeded Biden as the Democratic Party’s presidential nominee in July, after Biden suspended his reelection campaign following a disastrous debate performance against Trump. “He got 14 million votes and they threw him out of office,” Trump said during a debate with Harris on Tuesday. “And you know what? I’ll give you a little secret. He hates her. He can’t stand her.”
Harris visited Shanksville with Biden on Wednesday, and was seen at the fire station.
On Wednesday night, the White House issued a statement explaining Biden’s decision to don his rival’s campaign merchandise.
“At the Shanksville Fire Station, [Biden] spoke about the country’s bipartisan unity after 9/11 and said we needed to get back to that,” spokesman Andrew Bates wrote on X. “As a gesture, he gave a hat to a Trump supporter who then said that in the same spirit, [he] should put on his Trump cap. He briefly wore it.”
Shanksville is located in Somerset County, which voted 78% for Trump and 21% for Biden in the 2020 election.