President Biden met with former President Jimmy Carter on Thursday at his home in southern Georgia as the White House denied that Carter’s health was failing.
Before traveling north for an evening drive-in rally near Atlanta, Biden and first lady Jill Biden toured privately with the 96-year-old Carter for less than an hour in Platter, Ga.
Former First Lady Rosaline Carter, 93, came out of a house pushing a walker, but reporters did not see the former president.
White House Deputy Press Secretary Carine Jean-Pierre told reporters for Georgia that Carter was not motivated by any non-public health information that has survived longer than any other US president.
“The president and first lady have a long friendship with President Carter and Mrs. Carter. President Biden did, in fact, speak to President Carter the night before the inauguration. As we all know, they were not able to participate, ”Jean-Pierre said.
“They said on that call that they would try to join after the inauguration and since they are both in Georgia, they wanted to stop and say hello.”
The 78-year-old Biden took over as Delaware’s US president in 1977 as the country’s 39th president, four years before Carter’s inauguration.
Jean-Pierre noted that “Joe Biden was the first US senator to support former Governor Carter when he ran for president. So they have a long relationship that lasts a few decades.”
The trip to Georgia is to commemorate Biden’s 100th day in office, in part, a pair of Democratic victories in the Senate runoff elections on Jan. 5 that went out of control of the Senate and Biden’s power to pass legislation Expanded.
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