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(CNN) - Joe Biden told a popular black radio host Friday morning that anyone who is struggling to decide whether to support him or President Donald Trump in the election "is not black."
The Democratic nominee's comment came at the end of a tense, at times interview with Charlamagne tha God at The Breakfast Club .
An official intervened to say that Biden had to leave, and Charlamagne replied, "You can't do that to the black media!"
"I do that to the white and black media because my wife has to leave at six o'clock," Biden said, referring to the fact that apparently his wife, Jill Biden, needs to use the studio for broadcasts they built in her basement in Delaware when the coronavirus pandemic left Biden out of campaign activities. Glancing at his watch, Biden said, "Uh oh, I'm in trouble."
Charlamagne told Biden that he should go to his studio in New York City for another interview. "We have more questions," he told the former vice president.
"Do you have any more questions?" Biden replied. "Well, I will tell you something, if you have a problem deciding whether you are with me or with Trump, then you are not black," he added.
Charlemagne replied: "It has nothing to do with Trump. It has to do with the fact that I want something for my community. ”
"Take a look at my record, man!" Biden returned.
During the 2020 campaign, in some cases Biden has quickly become irritable when questioning his record groups that for the former vice president would be much worse with Trump. In November, he told a protester criticizing Barack Obama's performance on deportations: "You should vote for Trump."
The interview was Biden's first appearance on The Breakfast Club , a popular nationally syndicated radio show broadcast from New York City that featured other prominent Democratic presidential candidates during the primaries.
Biden's victory in the Democratic primary was fueled primarily by the support of black voters, especially older voters, who catapulted him to victory in South Carolina that paved the way for Biden to finish the race in the weeks that followed.
A Quinnipiac University poll released Wednesday says Biden has 81% support among black voters against 3% for Trump.
Vice President Biden has spent his career fighting alongside and for the American black community. He got his party's nomination earning every vote and getting to know the people where they are, and that's exactly what he plans to do this November, ”Biden senior adviser Symone Sanders wrote about the interview on Twitter.
He added: "The comments made at the end of the Breakfast Club were joking, but let's be clear about what the vice president was saying: he was making the distinction that he would put his record with the black community in front of Trump any day. Point".
The Trump campaign used Biden's comments to treat him as if he took black voters for granted.
Katrina Pierson, a senior adviser to Trump, said in a statement that Biden "believes black men and women are incapable of being independent or thinking freely."
In 2016 Trump argued that black voters should reject and support Democrats who he said had taken their votes for granted. "What the hell do they have to lose?" He said.
Biden has frequently criticized Trump's history of racist comments and actions, which includes questions about the citizenship of former President Barack Obama and his frustration with the arrival of immigrants from "countries of m ****". He has also referred to the white supremacists who demonstrated in Charlottesville, Virginia, and to those who protested on his account saying there were "very good people on both sides."
In the radio interview, Biden declined to name the people who were being considered for the vice president nomination, but said: “I guarantee that there are multiple black women being considered. Multiple ”.
READ: Could Michelle Obama be a candidate for vice president?
Charlamagne pressured Biden for his role in enacting the 1994 crime law, which Biden defended, saying that Hillary Clinton was "wrong" in 2016 when she apologized and that Republicans had insisted on including a mandatory minimum sentence.
Biden also defended his call to decriminalize marijuana instead of legalizing it. He said that, before legalizing it, he wants to wait and see the results of studies on "what affects, what does not affect the long-term development of the brain." "We should wait until the studies are finished," he said.
"I think we have decades of studies of real marijuana smokers," Charlemagne told him.
"Yes, I think so," Biden replied. "I know a lot of marijuana smokers," he added.
Donald Trump USA Elections Joe Biden
