Biden makes bizarre joke about how ‘thin’ his mom and dad’s walls were

President Joe Biden told a cracking joke about the “thin walls” of his childhood home that got the laughs of a Westchester County crowd.

He made the odd remark in a speech in New York’s Valhalla, where he blasted Republican bargaining power and said there was a risk that the US could default.

“We lived in a three-bedroom split-level home in a residential neighborhood that was a nice neighborhood when they were developing a suburb,” Biden shared.

‘With four children and a grandfather who lives with us. Looking back on it, I wonder how thin those walls were for my mom and dad, but anyway…” he laughed characteristically.

It was hard to say how the crowd took the comment, but in the past, Biden spoke of the thin walls growing up to make points about economic uncertainty. (The president grew up in Scranton, Pennsylvania before moving to Claymont, Del.)

In March, speaking at the anniversary of the Affordable Care Act, he also recalled growing up at home.

“I can remember we lived in a three-bedroom split-level house, and my bedroom was against the wall where my parents’ bedroom was in the — and my dad’s headboard was right there. And I — I remember one — I was about 14 years old. And I remember my dad – I could see him – you could hear he was just restless. And I asked my mom the next morning when he left for work, “What’s the matter?” She said, “Well, his company just told him they’re not going to pay the health insurance anymore.”

“How many people lie awake in bed wondering?

He made a similar point that same month while speaking about the budget – a topic that, along with the debt limit, was the subject of his speech on Wednesday.

“My father would probably be angry if I told him if he were alive. We lived in a three bedroom split level home. I mean, it was a nice house. We were a middle-class family with four kids and a grandpa, and the bed, my headboard was against my dad’s wall in the room with myself and my two brothers,” he said.

“My father was really restless. You could hear it one night. You could hear the bed and the next morning I asked my mom, “What’s up with daddy?” She said, “His company said no more health insurance. They wouldn’t pay for it.’

‘Well, guess what? Many people lie in bed at night wondering what they are going to do. Should they sell the house? What should they do if one of them gets really sick?’ he said.

He also shared what may have been a racing version when he was in Las Vegas in 2012.

“It was great for kids. Besides – having your grandfather live with you, your great aunt, really having your uncle. Those walls were terribly thin. I wonder how the hell my parents did it. But that is an other story. I know you know nothing about that. I know none of you in your families have done the same.’

As Biden concluded his remarks on Wednesday, he walked away from a podium, then waited for an official to show him the way. He looked at the man, pointed to a door in confirmation, then followed him as a recording of “Stars and Stripes Forever” played.

It was just one of the times the president sought guidance in finding the right exit from an event. Biden gets lost again as he tries to leave the stage tweeted the research arm of the Republican National Committee.

The strange moments came as Biden took his drive to try to force House Republicans to raise the debt limit down the road Wednesday — where he praised a House GOP member who voted for a budget plan that Biden rejected due to devastating cuts .

Biden flew to Westchester County, north of New York City, on Wednesday, where he immediately drew attention to Republican Rep. Mike Lawler, who defeated Democratic Rep. Sean Patrick Maloney last year.

“He’s on the other team,” Biden said. He called him one of “the kind of Republicans I used to hang out with” when he was a legislator for 36 years.

“He’s not one of those MAGA Republicans,” Biden said.

He kicked off his speech on the risks of austerity that House Republicans are demanding as the price for raising the country’s legal debt limit.

But Lawler himself, who won the seat with just 51 percent of the vote, voted for the House GOP budget that raised the one-year debt limit and had only a 1 percent increase in spending — below inflation and a return to last year’s levels.

Lawler has called for avoiding default by raising the debt ceiling, but also urged BIden to negotiate with Republicans.

He represents a Hudson River Valley district and is one of five Republicans who carried blue districts to bring the House under GOP control in November 2022.

“I welcome him, of course,” said Lawler before Biden’s trip. “I’m willing to listen to what he has to say. But we have to negotiate in good faith and I think it’s wrong and downright hypocritical to just take the course we’re not going to negotiate.”

Biden was not so generous to McCarthy, or what he called the “very extreme wing” of the Republican Party.

“Now they call themselves the MAGA Republicans,” he told a crowd in White Plains.

“They have taken control of the House. They have a speaker who has his job because he gave in to the MAGA element of the party,” Biden said.

While Biden and the Republicans appeared unsuccessful with a meeting on Tuesday, they agreed to talk again Friday, with the country potentially defaulting within weeks as the Treasury runs out of “extraordinary measures” to prevent the debt limit is exceeded.

That came a day after Biden brought forward the narrow vote McCarthy had to overcome to seize the gavel, including making deals with members of the House’s arch-conservative “Freedom Caucus.”

“They are literally holding the economy hostage by threatening to default on our nation’s debt that we’ve already incurred…unless we give in to their threats and demands about what they think we should do regarding the budget,” said Biden.

He said reducing spending levels to 2022 funding would amount to severe cuts to veterans’ benefits, teachers and law enforcement.

“The speaker and the Republicans don’t like that, I point that out,” Biden said. “But that’s not my opinion, it’s just basic math.”

He said the cuts, which protect defense spending, would result in the loss of 11,000 FBI agents, 2,000 Border Patrol agents and DEA agents.

“They should fire so many law enforcement officers,” he said.

He said the cuts would risk closing 375 air traffic control towers and eliminating 30 million veterans’ health visits by wiping out a $22 billion increase.

“There’s not enough staff,” he said. He even said the cuts could drive up veteran suicides by cutting aid. “They want to go back and fire those people who are now providing that kind of help,” Biden said.

The speech is part of an ongoing public effort to convince Republicans to withdraw their demands.

Biden earlier tweeted images of 217 House Republicans voting in favor of the budget saying they “undermine health care for veterans.”