Democratic presidential candidate Joe Biden on Saturday falsely claimed he was the vice president during the mass shooting at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Florida.
Biden was speaking at the Everytown for Gun Safety Action Fund's Presidential Gun Sense Forum in Des Moines, Iowa when he confused himself with Vice President Mike Pence, who is still serving in that role.
"The people who are going to make a difference in terms of giving some backbone to those Republicans in particular and a few Democrats who are afraid to take them on--all of you," Biden said. "We have to go into their communities, take them on. That's why Mayor Bloomberg is doing such an incredible job. He's using his fortune and his money to increase the safety of the American people."
Biden went on to say Democrats were going to organize against Republicans and supporters of the National Rifle Association.
"When you show up-- I watched what happened when the kids from Parkland marched up and I met with them and then they went off up to the Hill when I was vice president and then they went off the hill to go into those neighborhoods," Biden said. "All those congressmen were like 'No, I'm not here. I'm not here. Don't tell them I'm around.' They're afraid of it. They should be exposed. They should be exposed for what they refuse to do because they're being intimidated by the NRA."
The former vice president left office in January 2017. The deadly shooting in Parkland didn't occur until February 14, 2018. The Washington Post's Matt Viser tweeted, "It’s likely he means Newtown victims, who came in 2013."
'I watched what happened when those kids form Parkland came up to see me when I was vice president," Biden says. "Some of you covered it."
The Parkland shootings occurred in 2018, a year after he left the vice presidency. It’s likely he means Newtown victims, who came in 2013.
— Matt Viser (@mviser) August 10, 2019
Biden's gaffe is latest of a string of gaffes Biden has made over the course of the last week. Earlier in the week, he mistakenly referred to the mass shootings in El Paso, Texas and Dayton, Ohio, as having taken place in Houston and Michigan. On Thursday, he told a group of mostly Asian and Hispanic voters in Iowa that poor kids were "just as bright and just as talented as white kids." While Biden was quick to correct himself by adding, "Wealthy kids. Black kids. Asian kids" to his remarks, he received backlash on Twitter.
Viser tweeted out a quote on Saturday of Biden's response to his "White kids' comment.
"Look I misspoke I meant to say wealthy. I've said it 50 -- and on the spot, I explained it. At that very second I explained it. And so the fact of the matter is that I don't think anybody thinks that I meant anything other than what I said I meant," Biden said.
Biden on his gaffe: "Look I misspoke I meant to say wealthy. I've said it 50 -- and on the spot, I explained it. At that very second I explained it. And so the fact of the matter is that I don't think anybody thinks that I meant anything other than what I said I meant."
— Matt Viser (@mviser) August 10, 2019