Biden’s Story About Uncle Frank Doesn’t Add Up

At a military veterans event in Delaware, President Joe Biden told a detailed story about how as vice president he presented one of his uncles, Frank Biden, with a Purple Heart, which his uncle refused to accept. But the facts of Biden’s story don’t add up.

Frank Biden, who served in the Army during World War II, died in 1999 — when Joe Biden was a senator, not vice president.

Also, Biden said he got the Purple Heart for his uncle at the urging of his father, Joseph R. Biden Sr. But Biden’s dad died in 2002, when the current president was still in the Senate.

The president made his remarks on Dec. 16 at Major Joseph R. “Beau” Biden III National Guard/Reserve Center, the state’s National Guard headquarters, which was named after his son Beau, who died in 2015. He visited the center to urge military veterans to take advantage of new benefits available under the PACT Act.

Biden said his uncle “fought in the Battle of the Bulge” and “won the Purple Heart,” but “he never got it.” When Biden “got elected vice president,” he said his father urged him to get Uncle Frank a Purple Heart, which the Army says is awarded in the name of the president to “any member of an Armed Force or any civilian national of the United States wounded or killed, or who has died after being wounded” in a military conflict.

Biden said his Uncle Frank signed up for the Army a day after Pearl Harbor was attacked by the Japanese on Dec. 7, 1941.

Biden, Dec. 16: On the Finnegan side of the family, four brothers. Every single one volunteered the very next day, on Monday, to join. My uncle, Frank Biden, joined. My father was working in the shipyards. 

The fact of the matter is that, you know, it wasn’t a second thought. They just showed up. And there’s a generation, represented by you, Ray, that doesn’t look for accolades. 

You know, I — my dad, when I got elected vice president, he said, “Joey, Uncle Frank fought in the Battle of the Bulge.” He was not feeling very well now — not because of the Battle of the Bulge. But he said, “And he won the Purple Heart. And he never received it. He never — he never got it. Do you think you could help him get it? We’ll surprise him.”

So we got him the Purple Heart. He had won it in the Battle of the Bulge. And I remember he came over to the house, and I came out, and he said, “Present it to him, okay?” We had the family there.

I said, “Uncle Frank, you won this. And I want to…” He said, “I don’t want the damn thing.” (Laughter.)  No, I’m serious. He said, “I don’t want it.” I said, “What’s the matter, Uncle Frank? You earned it.” He said, “Yeah, but the others died. The others died. I lived. I don’t want it.” 

There are a few discrepancies in Biden’s story about his uncle.

We told the White House that we couldn’t find any support for the president’s story — at least how he told it. Both his uncle and father died in Wilmington, Delaware, years before Joe Biden became vice president. His uncle died at age 81 on Nov. 28, 1999, according to the Scranton Tribune, and his father died at 86 years old on Sept. 2, 2002, according to the Baltimore Sun. Joe Biden became vice president in January 2009.

We asked the White House if this incident happened and, if so, when. We asked if perhaps it occurred when Biden was a senator. But the White House did not answer our questions.

Also, our fact-checking colleagues at Snopes found that Frank Biden joined the Army on July 17, 1941 — which was months before the attack on Pearl Harbor, contrary to Biden’s claim that Frank Biden joined the Army a day after Pearl Harbor.

Snopes cited a Jan. 20, 2021, Facebook post by the National Cemetery Administration at the Department of Veterans Affairs, which gave the dates of Frank Biden’s service. (The NCA post also said Frank Biden was discharged from the Army on July 24, 1945 — seven months after the Battle of the Bulge commenced on Dec. 16, 1944. So it is possible that Frank Biden fought in that battle, although we cannot confirm that he did.)

We also couldn’t find any record that Frank Biden was awarded a Purple Heart, either while he was alive or posthumously.

Traces of War, a website on the history of global conflicts, says about 1.1 million World War II veterans received a Purple Heart, but its list of Purple Heart recipients does not include Frank Biden. The National Purple Heart Hall of Honor also keeps a list of those honored with the award, but Frank Biden does not appear on that website, either.

The White House did not tell us if Joe Biden secured a Purple Heart for his uncle. And, when we told the White House that we could find no record of Frank Biden receiving a Purple Heart, the White House pointed us to a disclaimer on the National Purple Heart Hall of Honor website that says, “Enrollment is voluntary as there is no comprehensive list of Purple Heart recipients in existence.” The Army also notes that “there’s not a consistent record kept” of Purple Heart recipients.

But whether Frank Biden received a Purple Heart isn’t the issue. Instead, it’s the president’s story of securing a Purple Heart, while serving as vice president, and trying to present it to his uncle that’s suspect. The White House couldn’t say whether such an event ever happened.


Editor’s note: FactCheck.org does not accept advertising. We rely on grants and individual donations from people like you. Please consider a donation. Credit card donations may be made through our “Donate” page. If you prefer to give by check, send to: FactCheck.org, Annenberg Public Policy Center, 202 S. 36th St., Philadelphia, PA 19104. 

The post Biden’s Story About Uncle Frank Doesn’t Add Up appeared first on FactCheck.org.

Related articles

Chicken Dinner at St. Stan’s on Sunday, May 19th

This is a great way to support the Mother Church of Polonia!

Stephen A. Smith Adamant That He Can Score on LeBron James in a One-on-One: ‘Y’all Are on Drugs!’

Stephen A. Smith couldn't believe his First Take colleagues didn't agree with his claim that he could score on LeBron James if the two of them played on-on-one.

The post Stephen A. Smith Adamant That He Can Score on LeBron James in a One-on-One: ‘Y’all Are on Drugs!’ first appeared on Mediaite.

Rodrigo y Gabriela @ Asbury Hall

Edit this setlist | More Rodrigo y Gabriela setlists The...

Jared Kushner blasted over new $500M ‘present’ from Serbian government



In Belgrade, Serbia, protesters voiced their displeasure with a real estate deal involving former Trump White House Senior Adviser Jared Kushner, former Trump Administration aide Richard Grenell and the Serbian government.

The project, according to the New York Times' Eric Lipton, calls for a $500 million hotel that would be built on the site the former Yugoslav Ministry of Defense. And it would, Lipton notes, put Kushner, "Directly into business with a European state as his father-in-law, Donald J. Trump, vies to return to the White House."

"The complex was bombed in 1999 by NATO forces with the backing of the United States during the war Serbia was then waging with Kosovo," Lipton explains.

"It is now considered a prime undeveloped real-estate site in the middle of a much-changed city, and Mr. Trump himself had considered building a hotel at the same site in 2013."

READ MORE:'Corrupt': Jared Kushner's overseas business deals under fire as Trump runs for president

The reporter adds, "For Mr. Kushner, who is also planning two luxury hotel projects in neighboring Albania, these deals in the Balkans are among the largest he has made since starting his investment firm, (Affinity Partners)…. Mr. Kushner and his partners plan to build a hotel, retail space and more than 1500 residential units."

But not everyone in Serbia's federal government is happy about the deal, which, according to Lipton, has "drawn criticism from opposition leaders in the Serbian parliament."

Lipton reports, "Protesters blocked traffic in front of the former defense ministry headquarters on Thursday and put up signs questioning the decision, including some that said: 'Stop Giving Army HQ as a Present to American Offshore Companies'…. Some in Serbia object to the plan because of the United States' role in the bombing 25 years ago."

Dragan Jonic is among the Serbian MPs voicing his opposition to the deal.

READ MORE: Comer refuses to investigate Trump family member over 'influence peddling' allegation

Meanwhile, in the United States, Rep. Jamie Raskin (D-MD) and Rep. Robert Garcia (D-CA) are among the Democrats who have been speaking out against Kushner's activities in Europe.

In a March, Raskin and Garcia warned, "Jared Kushner is pursuing new foreign business deals, just as Donald Trump becomes the presumptive Republican nominee for the presidency."

Read The New York Times' full report at this link (subscription required).

READ MORE: Mary Trump: Here's why Ivanka and Don Jr. haven't show up to their father’s 'tawdry' trial

Mike Johnson ‘undercuts’ Trump’s key campaign message with accidental admission: columnist



House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-LA) tried to back up former President Donald Trump's claims that non-citizens were voting in presidential elections during a Wednesday news conference — but his claim was accidentally revealing in a way that is bad for the former president, wrote Aaron Blake for The Washington Post.

This comes as Johnson has also suggested that if he were in a position to block election certification in 2024, under the same "circumstances" as 2020, he would do so.

“'We all know intuitively that a lot of illegals are voting in federal elections, but it’s not been something that is easily provable,' Johnson said. 'We don’t have that number."

This comment is "at least somewhat transparent," Blake said — but it "undercuts the leader of the Republican Party, former president Donald Trump, who has ridiculously pegged the number of illegal votes by undocumented immigrants in the 2016 election at 3 million to 5 million (just enough, as it happens, to explain away his 2.9 million-vote loss in the popular vote).

"After the 2020 election, Trump lawyer Rudy Giuliani also ridiculously pegged the number of such illegal votes in Arizona alone at between 40,000 and 250,000 — as many as 1 out of every 14 votes cast.

"Johnson, at the very least, is implicitly acknowledging that Trump’s and Giuliani’s numbers are pulled out of thin air. It’s part of a broader and long-standing effort in the GOP to water down Trump’s false voter-fraud claims and repackage them," Blake continued.

"But, given that — and given the continued GOP focus on this issue — it’s worth noting how much Republicans have found or come to admit that actual evidence of widespread voter fraud simply isn’t there."

ALSO READ: ‘Outrageous’: Army reservist with KKK ties still in the military

This includes Trump ally Rudy Giuliani admitting that there are "lots of theories" but they "don't have the evidence," far-right groups like True the Vote confessing that there's no proof of ballot stuffing when their claims went up in court, and a 2022 report from longtime Republican officials concluding that “there is absolutely no evidence of fraud in the 2020 Presidential Election on the magnitude necessary to shift the result in any state, let alone the nation as a whole."

Ultimately, concluded Blake, "Despite the lack of evidence and the abject failure of Trump’s post-2020 voter-fraud lawsuits, some lawmakers apparently feel compelled to construct a boogeyman to toe Trump’s line on combating voter fraud — even as they freely acknowledge they can’t say what the boogeyman is made of."