Top political gaffes of 2024

The presidential election generated numerous high-profile political gaffes this year, including President Biden’s widely-panned debate performance and him calling Trump supporters “garbage” in the closing days of Vice President Kamala Harris’ campaign. 

Here are six of the biggest political gaffes of 2024: 

A disastrous performance by President Biden during his debate with former President Trump on June 27 appeared to be the beginning of the end for Biden’s 2024 re-election campaign. 

He struggled with a raspy voice and delivered rambling answers during the debate in Atlanta, sparking doubts about his viability at the top of the Democratic Party’s presidential ticket. 

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Biden’s campaign blamed the hoarse voice on a cold and the 81-year-old admitted a week later that he “screwed up” and “had a bad night,” yet that didn’t stop a chorus of Democrats from making calls for him to drop out of the race. 

In a shocking move, Biden then pulled the plug on his campaign on July 21 and endorsed Harris, who would go on to lose to Trump in November. 

Biden appeared to galvanize Republicans when he called Trump supporters “garbage” less than a week before Election Day. 

Trump’s rally in Madison Square Garden in New York City on Oct. 27 made headlines when a comedian mocked different ethnic groups, calling Puerto Rico a “floating island of garbage.” 

Then, during a conference call with the Voto Latino group on Oct. 30, Biden said, “The only garbage I see floating out there is his supporters.”  

Biden and the White House then tried to clean up his words in the days afterward. However, the remark was quickly likened to Hillary Clinton’s labeling of half of Trump supporters as belonging in “a basket of deplorables” in 2016, a comment that was widely seen as undermining her campaign. 

Vice President Kamala Harris’ answer to a question during an Oct. 8 appearance on “The View” may have been a turning point in the 2024 presidential election. 

Co-host Sunny Hostin asked Harris, “If anything, would you have done something differently than President Biden during the past four years?” Harris paused for a moment and then said, “There is not a thing that comes to mind in terms of — and I’ve been a part of most of the decisions that have had impact.” 

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Hostin had given Harris a clear opportunity to differentiate herself from Biden, but Harris instead effectively cut an ad for Trump’s campaign by allowing it to tie her directly to an unpopular administration. 

Harris’ running mate Tim Walz raised eyebrows during his vice presidential debate with Sen. JD Vance, R-Ohio, on Oct. 1, when he declared he had “become friends with school shooters.” 

The poorly timed mishap occurred when the Minnesota governor was asked about changing positions on banning assault weapons.

“I sat in that office with those Sandy Hook parents. I’ve become friends with school shooters. I’ve seen it,” Walz said. 

Walz presumably meant he had become friendly with parents who lost children during horrific school shootings. 

Trump appeared to confuse then-Republican presidential primary opponent Nikki Haley with former House Speaker Nancy Pelosi during a rally in New Hampshire on Jan. 20.

Speaking in Concord, Trump said that Haley, his former ambassador to the United Nations, had been responsible for the collapse of Capitol Hill security during the Jan. 6, 2021, riot. Trump has previously blamed Pelosi for turning down National Guard support before the riot. 

“You know, by the way, they never report the crowd on January 6, you know, Nikki Haley. Nikki Haley, Nikki Haley, you know, they — did you know they destroyed all the information and all of the evidence. Everything. Deleted and destroyed all of it, all of it, because of lots of things, like Nikki Haley is in charge of security. We offered 10,000 people, soldiers, National Guard. So whatever they want, they turned it down. They don’t want to talk about that. These are very dishonest people,” Trump said. 

Harris found herself in the headlines repeatedly this year for making confusing verbal statements. 

“I grew up understanding the children of the community are the children of the community, and we should all have a vested interest in ensuring that children can go grow up with the resources that they need to achieve their God-given potential,” the vice president once said in September. 

“We are here because we are fighting for a democracy. Fighting for a democracy. And understand the difference here, understand the difference here, moving forward, moving forward, understand the difference here,” she then said at a campaign event in November. 

The remarks drew criticism and ridicule from conservatives online. 

President Biden mistakenly introduced Ukraine President Volodymyr Zelenskyy as “President Putin” during a NATO conference in Washington, D.C., in July.

“And now I want to hand it over to the president of Ukraine, who has as much courage as he has determination,” Biden said, before starting to leave the podium. “Ladies and gentlemen, President Putin.” 

“He’s going to beat President Putin. President Zelenskyy. I’m so focused on beating Putin,” Biden then said, appearing to realize the verbal stumble. “We got to worry about it. Anyway, Mr. President.” 

Fox News’ Paul Steinhauser, Joseph A. Wulfsohn, Jacqui Heinrich, Sarah Rumpf-Whitten, David Rutz, Brian Flood and Chris Pandolfo contributed to this report.