Biden says Trump's conversations with Bob Woodward show he has 'no conception' of national security

Joe Biden.
(Image credit: Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images)

Democratic presidential nominee Joe Biden told CNN's Jake Tapper on Thursday that he was stunned when he learned that President Trump disclosed to journalist Bob Woodward that the United States has a secret new nuclear weapons system.

"You wonder why people in the intelligence community wondered from the very beginning whether you could share data with him, 'cause they don't trust him," Biden said. "They don't trust what he'll say or do. He seems to have no conception of what constitutes national security, no conception of anything other than, what can he do to promote himself?"

Woodward interviewed Trump 18 times for his new book, Rage, and writes that the president shared with him, "I have built a nuclear — a weapons system that nobody's ever had in this country before. We have stuff that you haven't even seen or heard about."

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Catherine Garcia

Catherine Garcia is night editor for TheWeek.com. Her writing and reporting has appeared in Entertainment Weekly and EW.com, The New York Times, The Book of Jezebel, and other publications. A Southern California native, Catherine is a graduate of the University of Redlands and the Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism.