Earlier this week, President Joe Biden surprised absolutely no one when he announced on Wednesday that he’ll be running for reelection next year. Of course a big looming “if” hanging over the announcement is the fact Biden is the oldest-ever president and he turns 82 in 2024. So of course on Thursday’s episode of NBC’s “The Tonight Show,” Jimmy Fallon had plenty of jokes about Biden, and his age.
But Fallon defended Biden, joking that POTUS is “the same age as Lincoln… if he were still alive today.” The joke being that Biden was born in 1809.
First though, Fallon kicked things off with a look at this week’s state visit by South Korean President Yoon Suk Yeol and the impressive impromptu performance of “American Pie” by Don McLean he gave at the White House. “There’s always that one friend at karaoke who knows they’re good, you know?” Fallon joked. He also played an old newsreel clip edited to make it look like Harry Truman was singing “Unholy” by Sam Smith, which was pretty fun too.
Then Fallon got into Biden’s announcement, noting that Biden told reporters that when deciding to run again, he “took a hard look at his age.”
“Is it me, or does Biden always look like he’s taking a hard look,” Fallon joked as several pictures of Biden squinting appeared onscreen.
“Then Biden reminded everyone that he’s the same age as Lincoln… if he were still alive today,” Fallon continued.
After that, Fallon made some jokes about Biden’s very grandpa-ish demeanor at the White House’s “take your children to work day” this week, focusing on the moment when Biden was asked about his grandchildren and kind of meandered around talking about them. This moment was notable because the little girl who asked Biden about his grandchildren reminded him that he’d said he had five.
“Kid was like, ‘You might wanna take a harder look at that age thing,’” Fallon said. “Then Biden looked at the kid and said, ‘Hey what is this, ‘Meet the Press’? Cut me some slack.”
“Anyway, long story short, that kid’s parent was fired,” Fallon added.
Fallon went on to talk about Tucker Carlson and the live action remake of Disney’s “The Little Mermaid,” and then he did a skit parodying kids television shows. You can watch the whole thing at the top of the page now.
