Trump claims Biden wrote letter apologising for xenophobia accusation — Biden’s team says it never happened

Former VP never took explicit position on China restrictions until April when he declared support for decision

At a recent contentious White House coronavirus taskforce press briefing, president Donald Trump claimed that Joe Biden apologised for accusing him of xenophobia.

He also said that the former vice president had sent him a letter of apology.

The Biden campaign says that there was no letter, and that there was no apology.

“He has since apologised and he said I did the right thing,” Trump said, referring to an alleged incident on 31 January in which Mr Biden said that Mr Trump’s travel restrictions on China to thwart the spread of the coronavirus were xenophobic.

When questioned further about the travel restrictions, Mr Trump added: “Why did Biden apologise? Why did he write a letter of apology?”

However, the Biden campaign said that the comments made about Trump were more general, saying he has a history of “hysterical xenophobia”, and were not about the travel restrictions imposed on China.

It is also unclear whether Mr Biden had any knowledge of the decision to restrict travel from China when he made the remarks.

The campaign event in Iowa, at which he was speaking, started shortly after the briefing at which announcement was made by Health and Human Services secretary Alex Azar.

CNN’s fact checkers admit: “Given the timing of the Biden remarks, it’s not unreasonable for the Trump campaign to infer that the former vice president was talking about the travel restrictions.”

Mr Biden never took an explicit position on the China restrictions until April when the campaign declared his support for the decision — though he thought it could have been implemented quicker. His January comments about Mr Trump’s xenophobia are thought to refer to the 2017 Muslim travel ban.

While Trump is correct to say that the former vice president supports the China travel ban, there appears to be no evidence to suggest he ever thought it wrong, nor any evidence that he apologised for saying so — particularly in the form of a letter.