Although former President Joe Biden and former Vice President Kamala Harris once stood united on the 2020 Democratic ticket, new revelations suggest their political relationship may have fractured quietly behind the scenes, long before Biden officially endorsed her 2024 presidential run. A recently released book sheds light on what may have been the final tipping point in their already tense dynamic.
And surprisingly, it involves Donald Trump!
According to Original Sin: President Biden’s Decline, Its Cover-Up, and His Disastrous Choice to Run Again, written by CNN anchor Jake Tapper and Axios reporter Alex Thompson, Harris was left dismayed after a particular public moment involving Biden went viral.
It took putting on a Trump hat for Kamala to wake up? ‘What is he doing?’ Harris asked her team, according to the book. ‘This is completely unhelpful. And so unnecessary.’ The Harris campaign decided they would no longer campaign with Biden in the future, according to the book,… pic.twitter.com/N53394gZZ3
— Karli Bonne’ 🇺🇸 (@KarluskaP) May 20, 2025
The incident took place in September 2024 during a 9/11 commemoration event in Shanksville, Pennsylvania. While attending the memorial, Biden briefly wore a red “Trump” hat, a gesture that sparked confusion, outrage, and speculation.
The book claims Biden exchanged hats with a member of the public, reportedly as a friendly gesture. The attendee offered Biden his red Trump-branded hat, and Biden, in return, handed over his own. Although the president’s team later explained that it was meant to mean unity on a day of national mourning, the optics of the moment overshadowed the intent.
The incident happened just one day after a high-profile debate between Harris and Donald Trump, in which Harris was seen as delivering a strong and confident performance. Yet, the hat moment seemed to shift the focus away from her win. Social media quickly reacted, many users interpreting the image of Biden in a Trump hat as a form of accidental endorsement.
Even Trump’s campaign seized on the opportunity, posting on X (formerly Twitter), “Thanks for the support, Joe!” The post went viral, adding to the confusion and intensifying the narrative that Biden and Harris were not aligned.
According to Jake Tapper’s scathing new book, this is the exact moment it happened✔️😬
Kamala Harris was livid after Joe Biden put on a hat endorsing Donald Trump for president during her campaign. pic.twitter.com/7lE507I4An— Marla Hohner (@marlahohner) May 20, 2025
Behind the scenes, Harris was reportedly furious.
“What is he doing? This is completely unhelpful. And so unnecessary,” she said, according to the book.
Tapper and Thompson write that it was this very moment when Harris decided she would no longer publicly campaign with Biden. While the then vice president had previously been loyal to the President during earlier moments of criticism, this hat incident may have marked a personal and political breaking point.
Although Biden later endorsed Harris after withdrawing from the 2024 race in July, sources close to her team suggest that the working relationship between the two had been deteriorating for months. According to the book, Harris and her campaign were trying to subtly distance her image and messaging from Biden’s, especially in the lead-up to the primaries, when voter concerns about Biden’s age and health were dominating the headlines.
The tell-all book doesn’t hold back in its portrayal of Biden’s concluding months in office. It criticizes his decision to stay in the race longer than expected, even as signs of cognitive and physical decline reportedly raised internal concerns. While neither Biden nor Harris has officially commented on the specific claims in the book, their silence has done little to dampen the speculation.
Donald Trump claimed he got President Biden out of the race and called him “an old broken down pile of crap” on top of calling Kamala Harris “pathetic.”
Super rich coming from a guy who just begged strangers for praise.
He then praised dictators while Barron sat there like a… pic.twitter.com/79oARteOih
— Art Candee 🍿🥤 (@ArtCandee) July 4, 2024
Following the release of Original Sin, Harris has stayed relatively quiet, only breaking her silence to post a message of support and sympathy after news of Biden’s aggressive prostate cancer diagnosis was made public. Biden, too, has avoided commenting on the book’s contents, choosing instead to focus on his health and broader policy concerns.
For political observers, the Trump hat moment has become more than just a fleeting viral image, it now stands as a potential symbol of a bigger divide within the Democratic leadership at a crucial point in the 2024 election cycle.
Whether the relationship between Biden and Harris truly ended over a brief hat exchange, or whether it was just the final spark in a long-burning conflict, is open to interpretation. But if Original Sin is to be believed, Donald Trump may have played a far bigger role in the unraveling of their alliance than anyone previously realized.
Scroll below to see more glimpses of Biden Harris together.
New book suggests it was Trump who quietly triggered the rift between Biden and Harris during the 2024 campaign.
The then POTUS and VP clicked at an White House Event.
Are the feud rumor true? Remains to be seen or if either of the two make any comment.
