Could Ambien be the reason behind former President Joe Biden’s widely criticized debate performance against Donald Trump last year? Hunter Biden thinks so.
During a more than three-hour interview on the YouTube show Channel 5 with Andrew Callaghan that aired on July 21, Hunter Biden said his dad was experiencing effects from the prescription sleep aid while debating now-president Trump.
“I know exactly what happened in that debate,” Hunter Biden said in a three hour-plus interview on the YouTube show Channel 5 with Andrew Callaghan that aired July 21. “He flew around the world ‒ basically the mileage that he could have flown around the world three times. He’s 81 years old. He’s tired as s–t. They give him Ambien to be able to sleep. He gets up on the stage, and he looks like he’s a deer in the headlights, and it feeds into every f—ing story that anybody wants to tell.”
Biden isn’t the only public figure to blame regrettable behavior on Ambien. Years ago, Sen. Robert F. Kennedy’s daughter Kerry Kennedy blamed Ambien for a drugged-driving incident, for which she was acquitted in 2014. In 2018, comedian Roseanne Barr said she was “Ambien tweeting” when a racist tweet of hers about Obama White House aide Valerie Jarrett led to the cancelation of her ABC sitcom.
But what exactly is Ambien − and how does it affect the human body? Here’s what to know about the prescription sleep aide.
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What is Ambien?
Ambien, also known by its generic name, zolpidem, is a prescription medication used to treat insomnia by helping individuals fall asleep quicker and stay asleep.
The Food and Drug Administration has expressed concern over how Ambien can impair activities, such as driving, especially into the morning hours. “Patients with high levels of zolpidem can be impaired even if they feel fully awake,” the FDA wrote in a fact sheet about the medication.
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Joe Biden, now 82, and his former White House aides have previously blamed the president’s busy schedule for his poor debate performance on June 27, 2024, but have not publicly mentioned Ambien. A representative for the former president did not respond to a request from USA TODAY about Hunter Biden’s remarks about the sleeping drug.
What are the side effects of Ambien?
Ambien’s side effects include nausea, vomiting, muscle cramps and diarrhea.
The medication can also cause abnormal thinking and changes in behavior: “Some of these changes may be characterized by decreased inhibition … similar to effects produced by alcohol,” the FDA-approved labeling says.
Confusion and aggressiveness are also listed side effects. “Visual and auditory hallucinations have been reported as well as behavioral changes such as bizarre behavior, agitation and depersonalization,” the label adds.
Previously: Hunter Biden says Joe Biden was taking Ambien before disastrous debate against Trump
The label also warns against a possible worsening of depression or suicidal thinking. Impairments to alertness, motor coordination and vision have also been reported.
Complex sleep behaviors, during which a person engaged in activities while not fully away, such as sleepwalking, sleep-driving and sleep-cooking, have also been associated with Ambien, the American Addiction Centers reports.
Additionally, the drug has been linked to amnesia.
What have others said about Ambien?
After Barr’s comment about “Ambien tweeting,” Sanofi, a pharmaceutical company that makes Ambien, tweeted in response: “While all pharmaceutical treatments have side effects, racism is not a known side effect of any Sanofi medication.” Ambien was also one of the drugs found in Tiger Woods’ system after police found him asleep in his car in the middle of a highway.
Other Ambien users have reported a variety of side effects, including sleepwalking, binge eating and even driving at night without realizing or remembering the incidents.
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Janet Makinen, one of the lead plaintiffs in a 2006 class-action lawsuit against Ambien maker Sanofi-Aventis’ U.S. division, alleged she “ate hundreds of calories of food, including raw eggs, uncooked yellow rice, cans of vegetables, loaves of bread, bags of chips and bags of candy” while on the medication, according to an amended complaint in the lawsuit filed in the Southern District of New York.
The lawsuit also alleged that fellow plaintiff Christina Brothers, a financial analyst, remembers taking Ambien one night in May 2005 and waking up “on the concrete floor of a jail cell.”
The parties agreed to a stipulated dismissal in 2007 because differences in factual issues and the women’s injuries made it impossible for the case to be certified as a class-action lawsuit on behalf of other Ambien users.
Contributing: Joey Garrison and Ashley May
