Biden is Trump's favorite target in 2026: He mentioned his name 900 times
- Biden left office 20 months ago, but he remains Trump’s adversary.
- Trump blames Biden for problems with the economy, the borders, and ammunition supplies.
- Critics see this as an attempt to divert attention from Trump’s record.
A review by Reuters found that U.S. President Donald Trump has mentioned Joe Biden’s name nearly 900 times this year, dragging his predecessor into the center of the political debate as Republicans seek to retain their slim majority in Congress ahead of next month’s midterm elections.
Trump has made the Democrat a political target at a rate of three times a day through speeches, comments, and posts on his “Truth Social” platform, blaming him for issues ranging from inflation and immigration to ammunition shortages—even as the former president, 83, has largely withdrawn from public life while battling stage four cancer.
This approach reflects Trump’s efforts to keep Americans focused on the perceived failures of the previous administration rather than voters’ concerns about conditions under his watch, just six weeks before the elections scheduled for November 3.
Speaking to Republican supporters at a campaign rally in Dallas on the 9th of this month, Trump, 80, said the Democrats “gave you four years of disasters, chaos, and death under sleepy Joe Biden.”
Republican analyst Ryan Williams said, “Donald Trump always needs an opponent, and it’s best if it’s a single person rather than a party... He has done this throughout his tenure. He can use it to try to divert attention from any problems he is currently facing.”
The Reuters review counted the number of times Trump mentioned Biden since January, when the contours of the 2026 elections began to emerge.
The review found that Trump mentioned Biden’s name at least 890 times since January 1, during nearly 200 events and interviews and approximately 190 posts on his platform this year.
Biden’s name was mentioned at least 210 times in discussions related to the economy, 168 times regarding immigration, and 138 times concerning foreign policy and national security issues. Trump also blamed him for a range of other domestic issues.
Trump has criticized Biden on various occasions, from the premiere of First Lady Melania Trump’s film, to the National Prayer Breakfast, to the traditional Easter egg roll in the White House’s South Lawn.
During the NATO summit in Turkey in July, he set a record for the number of times he mentioned Biden in a single day, reaching 16 mentions. He blamed Biden for military ammunition shortages, rising housing costs, and damage to the reputation of the steel industry.
Presidents often blame their predecessors for certain problems—as Biden did with Trump—but Trump’s insistence on mentioning Biden 20 months into his second presidential term is exceptional in its persistence and frequency.
Defending Trump’s repeated references to his predecessor, White House spokesperson Olivia Wales said, “Joe Biden is the worst president in American history, and President Trump is working every day to clean up the mess he caused and make the United States stronger than ever before.”
T.J. Ducklow, Biden’s spokesperson, declined to comment on the report.
However, Megan Hayes, a former senior White House official during the Biden administration, attacked what she described as Trump’s “obsession.”
She said, referring to Biden’s victory in the 2020 election—which Trump falsely claims was stolen from him—“Mentioning his name 900 times in less than a year is not governance; it is an obsession. Joe Biden defeated him once, and Trump still cannot get over it. He is focusing on reopening the 2020 election file instead of lowering fuel and food prices for the American people.”
In February, Trump told one interviewer that he had the economy under control. Now, amid polls showing declining American confidence in the Trump administration’s handling of the economy, the incumbent president blames Biden for cost-of-living issues.
He wrote on Truth Social last week, “I hope everyone realizes that rising prices across America are due to sleepy Joe Biden and his administration, not Trump.”
Some of Trump’s supporters at the Dallas rally told Reuters that they believe Biden is responsible for inflation, even though he left office 20 months ago. However, polls indicate that it is Trump who is angering most Americans over inflation.
Inflation exceeded 9 percent during Biden’s presidency, driven in part by supply chain disruptions caused by the COVID-19 pandemic, Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, and the Biden administration’s spending to stimulate the pandemic-hit economy.
A key factor in Trump’s electoral victory was his promise to lower prices, yet they have remained notably high, partly due to his war with Iran.
The average monthly inflation rate during Biden’s four-year presidency was 4.95 percent, while the average monthly inflation rate since Trump took office has been 2.94 percent, rising to 3.4 percent last month.
Charlie Black, a veteran Republican analyst who sometimes criticizes Trump, said, “Politics is always about the future, not the past. So blaming your predecessor is useless, especially for an incumbent president, who must defend his record to help his party.”
Immigration is the issue after the economy where Trump most frequently mentions Biden.
While Trump’s expanded deportation campaign has sparked criticism and protests across the United States this year, he has repeatedly tried to blame his predecessor, claiming that Biden’s policies caused unprecedented levels of illegal immigration along the U.S.-Mexico border.
For example, after U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement officers killed two American citizens protesting in Minnesota in January, Trump blamed “Biden’s open-border policies” for “all the time we spend talking about Minnesota.”
The president frequently speaks about the high level of border crossings during Biden’s tenure and the stricter immigration policies adopted by the Trump administration, to the point that he recently admitted his White House advisors are urging him to stop talking about the topic.
Trump said in the Oval Office in August, “Even my speechwriters say, ‘Sir, no one wants to hear about the border anymore. We’ve done it.’” He added, “Biden couldn’t do it.”
Under pressure to end the war with Iran, which began about seven months ago, Trump has mentioned Biden at least 37 times. He accuses his predecessor of not taking a sufficiently tough stance against Tehran during his 2021–2025 presidency and of having “created a monster in Iran” in 2015 through the nuclear deal negotiated by then-President Barack Obama, of whom Biden was vice president.
Biden’s policy toward Iran centered on increasing economic pressure on the country, a stance Trump has now adopted amid sporadic clashes with Tehran.
Initially, Trump denied media reports that U.S. stockpiles of missiles and interceptors were rapidly depleting during the war. However, by May, he began blaming Biden for this shortfall.
Speaking to reporters aboard Air Force One on July 27, Trump said, “I’d like to have more [munitions], to be honest, but Biden gave so much to Ukraine.”
Biden has been held responsible for international crises around the world at least 138 times, including the wars in Ukraine and Iran, the U.S. withdrawal from Afghanistan, and excessive leniency toward China.
Trump has also directed numerous personal insults at Biden regarding his mental capabilities and his use of an autopen to sign certain documents, a practice employed by many presidents.
At an Easter event at the White House last April, Trump told a group of children that Biden “sent everything to the autopen because he couldn’t sign, let alone run a country.”
Among the favorite stops on Trump’s tour of guests through the “Presidential Walk of Fame” near the White House Rose Garden is a display dedicated to Biden. While portraits of other presidents are hung, an autopen is displayed to represent the former president.
