Actor George Clooney has come under fire for penning an op-ed in The New York Times calling for President Joe Biden to drop out of his reelection bid, likely against his 2020 opponent, former President Donald Trump, after the A-list actor appeared to insinuate he, like many other supporters, was shocked by Biden’s appearance during the CNN debate last month.
In particular, Dave Portnoy, the founder of Barstool Sports, criticized actor George Clooney for waiting until three weeks after his star-studded fundraiser, in which he raised millions of dollars for President Biden, to acknowledge he’s “a vegetable.”
“George Clooney, what a f—— hero this guy is, huh? Comes forward today — now, this guy threw a fundraiser, raised tens of millions, co-chair for Biden, three weeks ago. Today comes out, he’s like, ‘Guess what? The guy you saw in the debate, that vegetable, that’s f—— Biden, he’s a vegetable. He was a vegetable three weeks ago.’ Acting like he’s doing some heroic thing,” said Portnoy in a video posted to the X platform.
Clooney called on Biden to leave the 2024 race in his guest essay on Wednesday, writing, “It’s devastating to say it, but the Joe Biden I was with three weeks ago at the fund-raiser was not the Joe ‘big F-ing deal’ Biden of 2010. He wasn’t even the Joe Biden of 2020. He was the same man we all witnessed at the debate.”
WARNING: Graphic language
What a hero George Clooney is for coming forward 3 weeks after his fundraiser to declare Joe Biden a vegtable #Clooney https://t.co/OPb77L9mwd pic.twitter.com/6p0GDEW0Di
— Dave Portnoy (@stoolpresidente) July 10, 2024
Portnoy made an appearance Thursday on “Fox & Friends,” saying, “I couldn’t believe they let him do the debate which brings to the point – if all these people – Clooney… whoever, everybody knew that this man is basically a vegetable. Why would you ever let him do that debate unless you wanted to show the world that he is gone and get rid of him? It’s shameful.”
“It was every week, there was a different incident that you just can’t look by. And again, the things he was saying there are making no sense. He was slurring. So it was quite obvious that he was well into decline,” Portnoy continued. “And so to put him into a debate – when I saw that he was going to do a live debate, I spit out my coffee and was like ‘how? He cannot do it’. And then he couldn’t do it. And everyone is like ‘oh my God’ — where have you been? This is not new, you just haven’t been paying attention.”
Later, the Barstool Sports founder said if he was able to attend Biden’s Thursday evening press conference, he would ask the president, “Who is not letting you step down?” He then added: “Nobody wants to give up power. And he is the most powerful man in the world. And somebody is running that and doesn’t want to give it up. Who is it? This country is so politicized – Republicans believe one thing, Democrats the other – but I don’t know how anybody with a straight face can believe anything that is being said about the president.”
In his video, Portnoy continued: “So what, George? If [Biden] didn’t do the debate… and wasn’t a vegetable, you were just going to keep your mouth shut? And by the way, if you just found out Biden was a vegetable, where have you been for two years? Everyone knows he’s a vegetable.”
