On Saturday, the White House announced that Joe Biden’s oldest dog Champ passed away. Losing a dog must be awful. I have a dog (she’s my first dog and is still with us), but I can only imagine what it’s like to lose a beloved pet. As I prepared to write about this story, I came across rumors that conservatives are making fun of Joe Biden for mourning Champ.
The most notable source of this claim came from has-been actor turned leftist activist George Takei, claiming “Republicans are mocking Biden for showing grief over the loss of his dog.”
Republicans are mocking Biden for showing grief over the loss of his dog.
If you lose your dog but feel nothing, you might be a Republican.
— George Takei (@GeorgeTakei) June 19, 2021
I was curious about this accusation and decided to look around. Now, I have no doubt there are plenty of randos out there who probably have mocked Joe Biden, just as plenty of random liberals mocked Bush when his dog Barney died. But is it true that “Republicans are mocking” Biden? Like mainstream Republicans? I looked… and looked… and looked. Now, I can’t say I scoured all of social media, but I just couldn’t find a single example. I did, however, find a number of liberals claiming that Republicans were mocking Biden about his dog, but none of them provided any evidence of this, which I found unusual.
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First, I searched replies to Biden’s announcement on Twitter about the passing of his dog. I found zero Republican blue checks mocking Biden over the loss of his dog. It’s possible that I can’t see all of them, but I saw more people (likely on the left) using the announcement to make some commentary about the Israel/Palestine conflict. The most notable Republican I found who responded was Jenna Ellis, who was on Trump’s legal team. She wrote, “I’m so sorry for your loss. Dogs are truly man’s best friend.”
I’m so sorry for your loss. Dogs are truly man’s best friend. ❤️
— Jenna Ellis (@JennaEllisEsq) June 19, 2021
I checked the #ChampBiden hashtag and used various search queries to find any reference to Champ and to find anyone mocking Biden over the news.
I couldn’t find anything. Could I have missed something? Sure. But, clearly, mocking Biden over Champ’s death is hardly causing a surge of tweets mocking him over the loss. Again, I have no doubt that there are some randos using Champ’s death to poke fun at Biden–but as hard as I’ve tried, I’ve not found any evidence to justify the claim that Republicans are “mocking Joe Biden” for mourning his dog.
However, this stands in contrast to what happened after President Trump lost his brother Robert Trump last summer. White House reporter Andrew Feinberg literally mocked Trump after he posted a tribute to him on Twitter. And shortly after the news of Robert Trump’s death, the hashtag #WrongTrump trended on Twitter. That’s right, there were literally enough people on the left tweeting this to make it trend, including a self-described pastor:
Dear Grim Reaper,
You took the #wrongtrump.
— Bishop Talbert Swan (@TalbertSwan) August 16, 2020
So, while I can’t find any evidence of Republicans en masse mocking Biden over the death of his dog, what I can say for sure is that a lot more people mocked Trump following than death of his brother.
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