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- Eric Trump on Saturday tweeted an image of an imposing property he claims Joe Biden owns and is possible evidence of corruption by the Democratic presidential nominee.
- “The salary of a US Senator is $174,000 per year. This is Joe Biden’s house…. seems legit,” tweeted Trump, who is campaigning for his father, Donald Trump’s, reelection.
- But fact-checking site Snopes pointed out that Biden hasn’t owned the property for 24 years, and had bought it for a bargain price of $185,000 in 1974 when it was derelict.
- Visit Business Insider’s homepage for more stories.
Eric Trump, the son of President Donald Trump, tweeted a picture of a sprawling property he claimed is owned by Joe Biden, evidence of corruption by the Democratic presidential nominee.
But it turns out that Biden hasn’t owned the property for 24 years — having bought in 1974 at a bargain price and sold it on, fact-checking site Snopes found.
In the tweet, Trump, who is currently campaigning for his father’s reelection, shared the image of the home in Wilmington, Delaware, with the message “the salary of a U.S. Senator is $174,000 per year. This is Joe Biden’s house…. seems legit.”
The picture is an aerial shot of the 5 bedroom 10,000-square-foot former DuPont mansion in the Greenville area of Wilmington.
But Snopes pointed out that Biden hasn’t owned the property since 1996, when he sold it for $1.2 million.
According to Town and Country, Biden had bought the property in 1974 when still a junior senator, and shortly after the death of his first wife and infant daughter.
At the time the property was abandoned and needed significant renovations, and Biden paid $185,000 for it.
Biden has always placed his modest background at the core of his political persona.
He has campaigned on a pledge to help ordinary Americans whose lives have been damaged by the economic collapse caused by what he says is Trump’s botched handling of the coronavirus.
Biden has always been interested in real estate, according to Town and Country, and “began buying homes—especially those that were outside his budget—in his twenties, taking out multiple mortgages and receiving loans against life insurance policies.”
According to Forbes, Biden is currently worth about $9 million, with much of the money earned through lucrative speaking gigs and other positions after serving as vice president. About $4 million of his wealth is tied up in properties.
On Twitter, critics were quick to point out the multiple falsehoods in Trump’s tweet, highlighting that Biden hadn’t served in the senate since 2008, following his appointed as vice president by Barack Obama.
“Lol, this isn’t Biden’s house and he hasn’t been a senator in 12 years?” tweeted Bill Russo, a Biden campaign spokesman.
—Eric Trump (@EricTrump) October 17, 2020
The Trump campaign did not immediately respond to a request for comment on criticism of Trump’s tweet.
Twitter also did not immediately respond to a request for comment on the tweet, which remains on Eric Trump’s feed at the time of publication.
In recent days the Trump campaign has seized on emails published in the New York Post, whose authenticity has been disputed, which the Post claims show evidence of Biden’s son, Hunter’s, corrupt business practices in Ukraine.
Biden has described the article as a “smear campaign,” and US intelligence agencies are investigating whether information was leaked as part of a Russian disinformation campaign.
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