- Trump had a "cordial conversation" wit Biden in April 2020 about tackling COVID, Kellyanne Conway wrote in her new book.
- "Biden was especially engaged," she wrote, adding Trump said, "Everyone is wrong. He hasn't lost it."
- The call came after Conway asked on television why Biden wouldn't offer his support, she wrote.
During the 2020 presidential campaign, then-President Donald Trump attacked now-President Joe Biden for his age, called him "Sleepy Joe," and suggested he had dementia.
But Trump had a different impression after a call with Biden in April 2020 about tackling COVID, according to Trump's former senior counselor Kellyanne Conway.
"It was a cordial conversation, which I witnessed, and Biden was especially engaged," Conway wrote in "Here's the Deal: A Memoir," out Tuesday. "So much so that, after the call, President Trump looked at me and to my surprise declared: 'Everyone is wrong. He hasn't lost it.'"
The 10- or 15-minute conversation came after Conway called out Biden on television for criticizing the Trump administration rather than offering advice on what the Obama administration did that was effective. She asked why Biden wouldn't call the Trump White House and offer some support, instead.
Biden did most of the talking during the call, Conway wrote.
"He had prepared, maybe practiced his pitch, as if a Disney World animatronic had been flicked to 'on,'" she wrote.
Biden suggested four measures to combat COVID, she wrote, but each idea was "already weeks in development," except for Biden's suggestion to open a new Affordable Care Act enrollment period. The Trump administration had decided to cover all costs for uninsured with for COVID testing and treatment for up to 90 days instead of reopening enrollment, she wrote.
"Biden was clear and to the point," Conway wrote. "The stumbling and bumbling we saw on television were not nearly as evident on the phone—but they would return soon enough. Imagine if Trump had fallen up the stairs of Air Force One several times in a matter of seconds, as Biden did! But that day, Biden got to do what he had not done much of lately: offer his advice rather than attack the president."
Trump at the time was the oldest person elected president. Now, that distinction goes to Biden, who at 79 is only about four years older than Trump.