President Joe Biden’s Thursday night State of the Union address has received plenty of attention from news outlets and hosts, including Fox News’ Greg Gutfeld. The conservative satirist pounced on one moment in particular, introducing his coverage of the president’s speech by rhyming, “Biden was feeble, but at least he said ‘illegal.’ And so Democrats boo, because Biden said something true.”
He then played a clip from the speech in which Biden was interrupted by far-right Rep. Marjorie Taylor-Greene, who called for Biden to speak about the murder of Laken Riley. Taylor-Greene yelled, “Say her name!”
Biden appeared to pronounce Riley’s name “Lincoln” as he held up a button Taylor-Greene had handed him on the way in. The president said, “An innocent young woman who was killed,” as Taylor-Greene yelled out, “By an illegal!”
“By an illegal,” Biden continued. “That’s right. But how many of thousands of people are being killed by legals? To her parents, I say: My heart goes out to you. Having lost children myself, I understand.”
The unexpected moment was a departure from the language typically used by Democrats and liberals/progressives when speaking of undocumented people in the United States.
“You catch any of that?” Gutfeld crowed, mocking Biden’s enunciation and misspeaking. “First, Joe called Laken Riley, the murdered nursing student, ‘Lincoln Riley.’ ‘Lincoln’ Riley. I mean, I don’t blame him — it’s probably the first time he even heard of the poor girl.”
“And I give him points for trying. The bar is so low for Joe, I’m grateful he didn’t call her Charles Nelson Reilly,” Gutfeld continued, citing the famed ’70s game show regular. “But were the media, the libs, pissed off at that? No, that would mean they actually have a heart. What was worse than mangling the victim’s name was mislabeling her vicious attacker, her vicious killer.”
Gutfeld then played a clip of Nancy Pelosi as she explained of Biden, “He should have said ‘undocumented.’ It’s not a big thing, OK?” She told CNN’s Dana Bash, “We usually say ‘undocumented,’ he said ‘illegal.’”
“Think about that,” Gutfeld continued. “The takeaway for a CNN anchor, Dana Bash, is the word allocated for a murderer, not the President’s ignorance and ambivalence over the victim. Feelings of murderers matter more than their victims or their families.”
Gutfeld continued with an attack on trans women, adding, “But remember, these are the same people who chastise anyone who misgenders murderous men who claim to be women. We must comply to their evil demands even if they don’t comply to the laws of humanity.”
He cited the New York Times’ coverage of the incident, which read, “Mr. Biden’s use of the term triggered immediate backlash from liberal Democrats and immigration advocates, who accused the president of dehumanizing undocumented migrants by highlighting the killing and using the term ‘illegal.’”
“So Biden accidentally told the truth and called an illegal immigrant ‘an illegal,’ and the media pounces,” Gutfeld said.
Riley, 22, was a Georgia nursing student who was killed while on a jog on Feb. 22. Jose Ibarra, a 26-year-old Venezuelan citizen, has been accused of her murder. Authorities have said Ibarra entered the U.S. illegally in 2022 and has been in the country since. Ibarra, who had no apparent connection to Riley before the attack, has been charged with malice murder, felony murder, aggravated battery, aggravated assault, false imprisonment, kidnapping, hindering a 911 call and concealing the death of another.
Watch the segment with Greg Gutfeld in the video above.
