US President Joe Biden got big laughs on Wednesday with a unusually personal barb aimed at Donald Trump.
“By the way, remember when he was trying to deal with Covid, he suggested just inject a little bleach in your veins?” Biden said at an event where he was endorsed by North America’s Building Trades Union. “He missed. It all went to his hair.”
The audience erupted in laughter, with some standing as they applauded the line.
“I shouldn’t have said that,” Biden said as the audience continued to laugh.
Trump never suggested injecting bleach specifically, but came awfully close in the early days of the Covid-19 pandemic.
“And then I see the disinfectant where it knocks it out in a minute — one minute — and is there a way we can do something like that by injection inside, or almost a cleaning?” Trump said in April 2020. “Because you see it gets in the lungs and it does a tremendous number on the lungs, so it would be interesting to check that.”
That led several disinfectant makers to issue statements warning consumers not to use their products in that way.
Bleach, however, can be used to lighten hair colour.
It’s not clear how Trump gets the colour of his trademark ’do, but one thing is clear: He puts a lot of effort into maintaining that signature look. Trump wrote off $70,000 (£56,000) in hairstyling expenses when he hosted The Apprentice, according to tax records obtained by The New York Times in 2020.
He occasionally lets a fan run their fingers through his hair to prove it’s real, and Tonight Show host Jimmy Fallon infamously did so as well during the 2016 presidential campaign.
In one anecdote relayed by actor Seth Rogen, the former president told porn star Stormy Daniels that he derives power from his hair, like Samson in the Bible ― and that if he lost his hair, he would lose his power, too.
Trump is currently on trial in New York City in a criminal case related to hush money payments made to Daniels, who alleges the two had an affair in 2006, which Trump denies.