Hunter Biden said during a recent interview that Democrats should “turn the temperature up” when addressing political extremism, while insisting he was not calling for violence, as reported by The New York Post.
The comments were made on the “Wide Awake Podcast” earlier this month during a conversation with host Joshua Rubin.
Rubin asked Biden whether both parties needed to “turn the temperature down” amid rising extremism, saying tensions appeared to be escalating.
Biden responded that he did not believe that was realistic. “I’m going to get myself in trouble for saying this. No, we need to turn the temperature up. We need to turn the temperature up, and we need people to see it for what it is,” Biden said.
He continued, “And what I mean by that is this: I do not believe that we are going to get to the bottom until we get to the bottom. And I want to get to the bottom faster rather than through this slow kind of process of just being picked apart — a death by a thousand cuts here.”
Biden clarified that he was not endorsing violence.
“What I mean by turning the temperature up is we need to speak truth to power,” he said. He added that Democrats should be more direct when addressing political and institutional conflicts.
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“We need more people in my party, in the Democratic Party, more people in elected positions or in positions of power, or the talking heads that get paid to go on MSNBC [now MS NOW], they need to start talking about this as it is, not as a conjecture about whether or not the Supreme Court [sic] and this debate.”
Biden also criticized members of the media, naming CNN host Jake Tapper while referencing a recent text-message interview Tapper conducted with President Donald Trump.
“You have people like Jake Tapper who are having hardball discussions with Donald Trump over text. Like, what the f— are you talking about, man? That’s not journalism. That’s a complete and utter abdication of responsibility as a journalist,” Biden said.
Tapper’s text-message interview drew criticism from MS NOW host Lawrence O’Donnell at the time.
O’Donnell said, “CNN presented a so-called interview… that they can’t even prove was Donald Trump. They called it ‘breaking news,’ they called it ‘an exclusive, new interview with President Trump.’
That’s what they called it, before the interviewer said this,” referencing Tapper’s explanation that Trump answered the questions via text.
A CNN spokesperson defended Tapper in a statement to Fox News Digital, saying, “Jake Tapper is a journalist — CNN journalists will always take any opportunity to ask questions of those in power and share what we learn with our audience.”
Biden also criticized CNN host Abby Phillip and CNN political commentator Scott Jennings.
“He goes out there, and he says, just parrots the talking points of the administration. And everybody does that, has done that in the past, but not when they’re parroting what are verifiable lies. And then Abby Phillips, ‘Well, that’s just not true, Scott,’” he said.
CNN did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
Biden said the broader media environment was being “gobbled up by oligarchs.”
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