Biden campaign says Trump's attacks are 'beneath the dignity of the office'

Joe Biden’s campaign swung back at President Trump on Tuesday, calling his attacks on the former vice president while traveling in Japan over the Memorial Day weekend “beneath the dignity of the office.”

Members of both parties had criticized Trump in recent days after he tweeted that he has “confidence” in North Korean dictator Kim Jong Un and quoted North Korean state-run media’s assessment that Biden is a “low-IQ individual.”

But Biden’s presidential campaign had refrained from weighing in until shortly after Trump touched down in the United States on Tuesday afternoon.

“The President’s comments are beneath the dignity of the office,” Kate Bedingfield, Biden’s deputy campaign manager, said in a statement issued moments after Marine One landed on the South Lawn of the White House. “To be on foreign soil, on Memorial Day, and to side repeatedly with a murderous dictator against a fellow American and former Vice President speaks for itself.”

Bedingfield added that Trump’s actions are “part of a pattern of embracing autocrats at the expense of our institutions — whether taking [Russian President Vladimir] Putin’s word at face value in Helsinki or exchanging ‘love letters’ with Kim Jong Un.”

Here's what Trump had to say about Joe Biden earlier this week:

"Kim Jong Un made a statement that Joe Biden is a low IQ individual. He probably is, based on his record. I think I agree with him on that" https://t.co/QMGCUMaW93 pic.twitter.com/bWFc8T5cUu

— POLITICO (@politico) May 28, 2019

Trump campaign spokesman Tim Murtaugh responded by saying it was “rich” of the Biden campaign to criticize Trump, considering that Biden had “bashed” the president while on foreign soil at the Munich Security Conference this year.

“If you want an example of ‘siding with a murderous dictator,’ how about the disastrous Iran nuclear deal?” Murtaugh said in a statement. “Or failing to follow through on the ‘red line’ with Syria? From the Iraq war to the Russia reset, Joe Biden has been wrong on virtually every foreign policy call in the last four decades. Just ask former Obama Defense Secretary Robert Gates.”

Gates wrote in his memoir that Biden has “been wrong on nearly every major foreign policy and national security issue over the past four decades,” although he recently told CBS’s Margaret Brennan that he and the former vice president “agreed on some key issues” during the Obama administration.

Trump weighed in with a tweet Tuesday evening.

“I was actually sticking up for Sleepy Joe Biden while on foreign soil,” Trump claimed. “Kim Jong Un called him a ‘low IQ idiot,’ and many other things, whereas I related the quote of Chairman Kim as a much softer ‘low IQ individual.’ Who could possibly be upset with that?”

"I don't know what that means... I do not understand."@andersoncooper responds to President Trump's recent tweet about presidential candidate Joe Biden https://t.co/1QIbmYOAmC pic.twitter.com/hKmrmmAVJ1

— Anderson Cooper 360° (@AC360) May 29, 2019

North Korea’s state-run news agency had called Biden “a fool of low IQ.” The insult was a response to Biden’s statement at a campaign rally that Trump embraces “dictators and tyrants like Putin and Kim Jong Un.”

During a joint news conference with Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe on Monday, Trump attributed the North Korean media statement about Biden’s “low IQ” to Kim.

“He probably is, based on his record,” Trump said of Biden. “I think I agree with [Kim] on that.”

Among those criticizing Trump for his comments was Rep. Adam Kinzinger, R-Ill., a military veteran who sits on the House Foreign Affairs Committee. Kinzinger cited the Memorial Day holiday in taking issue with Trump’s message.

“It’s Memorial Day Weekend and you’re taking a shot at Biden while praising a dictator,” Kinzinger tweeted Sunday. “This is just plain wrong.”

“I don’t know that you can compare the sort of disorganized, loose ends quality of Joe Biden versus the utter chaos of Donald Trump. I think there’s a contrast there, a pretty pronounced contrast, but we’ll see” - @Eugene_Robinson w/ @NicolleDWallace pic.twitter.com/ffo2ApnJem

— Deadline White House (@DeadlineWH) May 28, 2019

A Biden campaign official said Tuesday that the campaign held off on sending out a statement earlier in response to Trump’s remarks because the vice president “is committed to respecting the sacred purpose of Memorial Day.”

White House press secretary Sarah Sanders defended Trump’s comments Sunday. Asked during an appearance on NBC’s “Meet the Press” about whether Americans should be concerned that Trump is “essentially siding with a murderous, authoritarian dictator,” Sanders responded: “The president’s not siding with that. But I think they agree in their assessment of former vice president Joe Biden.”