ABC(NEW YORK) — Former Vice President Joe Biden shared an emotional moment with co-host Meghan McCain on The View Wednesday morning as they discussed her father’s brain cancer diagnosis.
“We’re like two brothers who were somehow raised by different fathers or something,” Biden said of Sen. John McCain, who was diagnosed with the same kind of brain cancer that killed Biden’s son, Beau.
Biden moved to sit next to Meghan McCain, saying that her father is seeing one of the doctors his son consulted after being diagnosed with glioblastoma.
Meghan McCain and Biden held hands and both started tearing up when the former vice president talked about the hope that his son kept alive even after getting “this devastating diagnosis like your dad.”
Biden added that Beau, who died in 2015, said “we’re not going to talk about percentages” after receiving the diagnosis.
“Beau is missing, but we’ve all decided to not talk about the loss as much as the inspiration he was to all of us,” Biden said.
Speaking about the continued speculation about his own future, Biden didn’t give a concrete answer about whether he will run for president again in 2020, saying that time will tell.
“If I were offered the nomination by the Lord Almighty today, I would say ‘no’ because we’re not ready. The family’s not ready,” Biden said, but added that if he were asked next year, “I may very well do it.”
Earlier in the interview, Biden also shared his excitement about his former colleague Doug Jones’ special election win in Alabama.
“This is not just about rejecting Trump — which was real — but it’s about Doug Jones,” Biden said.
Biden, who campaigned on behalf of Jones, said Jones’ victory was not only “a repudiation of President Trump’s tactics,” adding that some people in Alabama might be “a little ashamed” of those tactics.
Biden said he believes “it wasn’t just his opponent’s record” that drew people to the polls to vote for Jones on Tuesday night. He was referencing Jones’ opponent, Republican Roy Moore, who had come under fire in recent weeks for alleged sexual misconduct, as well as comments he had made about slavery.
Biden praised Jones’ character.
“This guy is a very serious guy,” Biden said of Jones. “He is real. His dad was a steelworker. He understands how to talk to the middle class.”
“I just think I’d rather focus on the positive side of Doug Jones than the ugly side of that side,” Biden said.
Speaking about what he saw as some of the ugliness of politics, Biden called Trump’s tweet about Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand on Tuesday “disgusting.”
Trump had tweeted that Gillibrand, D-N.Y., who has called for his resignation, “would do anything” for campaign contributions. Gillibrand called the president’s remarks “a sexist smear.” During the signing of the National Defense Authorization Act on Tuesday, Trump ignored a reporter’s question about what he meant by the tweet.
Biden said that even if Trump’s claim that he speaks about men the same way he speaks about women is true, Biden balked at “the idea that the president is so tone-deaf” as to apply that language to a female politician.
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