Finnegan, Biden’s mother’s brother, “was shot down in New Guinea,” Biden said. The president said Finnegan’s body was never found and that “there were a lot of cannibals” in the area. Biden, who also relayed a version of the story earlier in the day after stopping at the memorial in Scranton, did not delve into specifics.
The U.S. government’s missing service file does not attribute Finnegan’s death to hostile action or indicate that cannibals were a factor.
“We have a tradition in my family that my grandfather started,” said Biden, a toddler at the time of his uncle’s death in 1944. “When you visit a family member’s grave – this will seem strange to you – but you say three Hail Marys And that’s what I did on the site.
Referring to Trump, the presumptive GOP presidential nominee, Biden said: “This man does not deserve to have been commander in chief to my son, my uncle. »
Biden’s eldest son, Beau, died in 2015 of brain cancer, which the president said was linked to his son’s year-long deployment to Iraq, where the military used burn pits to dispose of waste .
Some former Trump officials claimed the then-president disparaged fallen service members as “suckers” and “losers” when, they said, he did not want to go to 2018 in a cemetery for American war dead in France. Trump denied the allegation, saying: “What animal would say such a thing? »
According to the Pentagon Defense POW/MIA Accounting Agency, Biden’s uncle, known to the family as “Bosie”, died on May 14, 1944, while he was a passenger on an Air Force plane that, “for reasons unknown,” was forced to land in the Pacific Ocean off Biden’s northern coast. New Guinea. “Both engines failed at low altitude and the nose of the aircraft hit the water hard,” the agency said in its listing of Finnegan. “Three men failed to escape the sinking wreck and were lost in the accident.”
The agency said Finnegan was a passenger on the plane at the time of its loss. “He was not associated with any remains found in the area after the war and remains missing,” according to the agency.
White House spokesman Andrew Bates did not address the discrepancy between the agency’s records and Biden’s account when he issued a statement on the matter.
“President Biden is proud of his uncle’s uniformed service,” Bates said, adding that Finnegan “lost his life when the military plane he was on crashed into the Pacific after taking off near the New Guinea”.
Biden “highlighted his uncle’s story in pleading to honor our ‘sacred commitment…to equip those we send to war and to care for them and their families when they come home’ , and reiterating that the last thing American veterans are are “suckers” or “losers.”
The Democratic president also made erroneous statements about when his uncles enlisted in the military, saying they joined “when D-Day came, the next day,” in June 1944, then that they had in fact joined him a few weeks after the December 7, 1941 attack on Pearl Harbor.
After Finnegan’s death, a local newspaper published a telegram from General Douglas MacArthur expressing condolences to Finnegan’s family:
“Dear Mr. Finnegan: On the passing of your son, 2nd Lieutenant Ambrose J. Finnegan Jr., while serving his country, you have my deepest sympathy. Perhaps your consolation will be that he died in the uniform of our beloved country, serving in a crusade that will bring about a better world for all. Very faithfully, Douglas MacArthur.
Biden, in his 2008 book “Promises to Keep,” only briefly mentioned his uncle, describing him as an airman killed in New Guinea.
