Joe Biden's bloody eye was the perfect metaphor for his disastrous CNN climate town hall

Former Vice President Joe Biden and CNN's Anderson Cooper.
(Image credit: Screenshot/CNN via Twitter)

Joe Biden had a terrible performance at CNN's town hall on the climate crisis, and he has the battle scars to prove it.

The former vice president joined other 2020 candidates Wednesday night to discuss their promised answers to climate change and, naturally, some questions left a few contenders stuck. But Andrew Yang's non-answer to quantifying carbon reduction was nothing compared to the whammy Biden suffered when asked about an upcoming fundraiser hosted by a founder of a fossil fuel company.

Early in Biden's time onstage, he was hit with what The New York Times called "probably the toughest question of the night:" How can Biden take on the fossil fuel industry when he's holding a Thursday fundraiser hosted by Andrew Goldman, a co-founder of liquefied natural gas production company? Biden first insisted Goldman is "not a fossil fuel executive," then seemed not so sure, and then recentered the blame on his staff.

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The rest of Biden's time onstage didn't go so well either. He constantly fought off questions about whether his climate plan was "aggressive enough," and, as usual, leaned on his time working with former President Barack Obama. And then, adding injury to insultingly bad answers, Biden finished the night with a mysteriously bloody eye. Kathryn Krawczyk

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Kathryn Krawczyk

Kathryn is a graduate of Syracuse University, with degrees in magazine journalism and information technology, along with hours to earn another degree after working at SU's independent paper The Daily Orange. She's currently recovering from a horse addiction while living in New York City, and likes to share her extremely dry sense of humor on Twitter.