‘This man is pathologically ill’: Mister Rogers’ widow rips Trump into ‘horrible person’

The widow of Mr. Rogers does not want President Trump as a neighbor.

Joanne Rogers, the 92-year-old wife of the late Fred Rogers, lambasted the president on Thursday, calling him a “horrible person” who “rarely tells the truth.”

She made the remarks on the same day Trump held a rally in Latrobe, Pennsylvania, which is Fred Rogers’ hometown, about 40 miles east of Pittsburgh.

For 31 seasons, Fred Rogers hosted the half-hour children’s educational show, Mister Rogers’ Neighborhood, which aired nationally on public television.

The final episode aired August 31, 2001. There has been renewed interest in the life and work of Fred Rogers, particularly since Tom Hanks portrayed him last year in the hit film A Beautiful Day in the Neighborhood.

Rogers died in 2003, leaving behind his 51-year-old wife, Joanne, and their two children.

Trump held a rally Thursday at Arnold Palmer Regional Airport in Latrobe, but Joanne Rogers doesn’t seem eager to welcome him to her neighborhood.

“This man is pathologically ill. Mentally ill,’ Rogers said The daily beast.

When asked what she would do if Trump were re-elected, she replied, “I’ll probably go into mourning.”

‘I can’t even imagine. I would feel so bad.

Rogers said her husband never talked about politics because he was doing a children’s TV show and feared it would disrupt children’s lives in their homes.

“Fred tried to be pretty quiet about politics, basically because his program was aimed at kids,” she said.

Joanne Rogers, on the other hand, feels free to speak her mind.

“I’m alone now,” she said. “I don’t do programs for children.”

When asked why she disliked the president, she replied, “I think maybe the fact that Mr. Trump rarely tells the truth.

If he does, it’s just luck, I think.

‘But the fact [is] that I can’t believe anything he says, not even the simplest thing.

Rogers said she enthusiastically supports Trump’s Democratic opponent, former Vice President Joe Biden.

“I’m a huge Biden fan,” Rogers said.

When asked why she supported Biden, Rogers said he was what the country needed right now.

“I think he’s nice,” she said.

“I think we all need someone like Biden who can give us a pat on the back.”

Joanne Rogers also defended Biden against accusations that he was too physical in his interactions with women.

Many accusations against Biden stem from awkward photographs, including one in 2015 where he is shown grabbing Stephanie Carter’s shoulders from behind and whispering in her ear as her husband Ash Carter gave his acceptance speech. Secretary of Defense.

Other photos show him awkwardly groping The Hill reporter Amie Parnes at a holiday party in 2013.

And another image captured the then vice president getting so close to a woman during a 2012 campaign stop in Ohio that his forehead touched the side of her head.

But the most serious accusations came in March 2019, when Nevada legislator Lucy Flores revealed in New York Magazine that Biden grabbed her shoulders and kissed her hair at a campaign event in Las Vegas in 2014 – she was 35 at the time.

“I felt him approach me from behind. He leaned in further and inhaled my hair,’ then ‘continued to plant a big, slow kiss on the back of my head,’ Flores wrote.

Biden’s critics rushed over the revelations, and the “Creepy Joe” hashtag quickly started trending on Twitter.

Trump has often dubbed Biden as ‘Creepy Joe’ in Twitter attacks – he has also called his Democratic rival ‘Sleepy Joe’.

Joanne Rogers said she would be happy to receive a hug from the Democratic candidate.

“I said, ‘Look, I completely understand, I’m a hug, and I would definitely like a hug from him,'” she said.

When asked if she thought Biden was too old to be president, she replied, “Seventy-seven still seems pretty young to me.”

Biden’s critics, including the president and his supporters, have claimed the former vice president is showing signs of cognitive decline.

But Biden supporters, including Rogers, believe his frequent verbal gaffes are the result of a stutter.

“Sometimes when Biden has trouble with his speech, I think it has to do with that old stutter,” she said.

Rogers said she remembered her husband while watching a video of Biden encouraging a young boy who struggled with a stuttering problem.

In a clip played during last month’s Democratic National Convention, 13-year-old Brayden Harrington said he met Biden a few months ago during the primaries and discussed the obstacle they both share.

Biden had a severe stutter as a child and says he had to spend hours training and learning special techniques to find a way out.

He said Biden “made me feel more confident about something that has bothered me my whole life.”

Joanne Rogers said it reminded her of her husband’s favorite episode of Mister Rogers’ Neighborhood, when her husband welcomed 10-year-old boy Jeffrey Erlanger to his show in 1981.

Erlanger, who at the time was a young boy from Madison, Wisconsin, was confined to a wheelchair after being diagnosed with a spinal tumor when he was just 7 months old.

Surgeons removed the tumor, but the condition left him a quadriplegic. Before his operation, his parents asked him what he wanted.

Erlanger told them he wanted to meet Mr. Rogers. His sister wrote a letter to Fred Rogers, and the family arranged to meet at a nearby restaurant in Milwaukee.

Several years later, Erlanger appeared on the Mister Rogers show, where he talked about his electric wheelchair. The two became friends from then on.

When Fred Rogers was inducted into the Television Hall of Fame in 1999, Erlanger surprised him and the rest of the audience by appearing to introduce him to the podium on stage.

After Fred Rogers died in 2003, Erlanger attended the memorial service in Pittsburgh to honor him.

Erlanger, who spent his life as an activist, died aged 36 in June 2007. He spent three weeks in a coma after choking on food before succumbing.

“It was Fred’s favorite,” Joanne Rogers said. “It’s just a fabulous segment.”