President Donald Trump sparked backlash after he used the death of former President Jimmy Carter to criticize former President Joe Biden, saying Carter “died a happy man” knowing that that Biden's leadership was “worse” than his.
Carter, the longest-lived president in U.S. history, died in December at 100 years old. His funeral was one of pomp and circumstance, and projected an aura of unity amid the political turbulence that characterized the 2024 election cycle.
The Carter family is no fan of Trump.
According to Jason Carter, one of Carter's grandsons and the board chairman of the Carter Center, Trump embodies "a meanness and a darkness" that sharply contrasts with Carter’s values. Unsurprisingly, Trump was the only president not asked to contribute a video tribute for an Atlanta concert honoring Carter.
The notoriously thin-skinned Trump likely had this on his mind when he told reporters the following in the Oval Office:
“And then you had like the last administration, the only thing they were good at was cheating in elections. That‘s about all they could do. They couldn‘t do anything. They were useless. They were incompetent.”
“Worst administration in the history of our country. Worse than Jimmy Carter. Jimmy Carter died a happy man. You know why? Because he wasn‘t the worst. President Joe Biden was.”
You can hear what he said in the video below.
Before Carter’s death, Trump regularly mocked the 39th president, labeling his administration among the “worst” in U.S. history. On the 2024 campaign trail, he often compared Carter to Biden, calling the current president “the worst” and saying he made Carter look “brilliant” by comparison.
After Carter passed, however, Trump struck a more respectful tone and described Carter as a “good man” and “very consequential, far more than most presidents, after he left the Oval Office.” He later joined other living presidents in attending Carter’s funeral.
Even so, Trump has spent part of his early second term vowing to dismantle some of Carter’s legacy—threatening to walk back the 1977 treaty returning control of the Panama Canal to Panama and proposing to eliminate the Department of Education, established in 1979.
His dig at Biden also underscores how much Trump refuses let go of his election conspiracy theories—continuing to claim he won an election Biden won decisively.
Many have condemned his remarks.
So much for not speaking ill of the dead.