Politics

Family tells Biden ally: ‘He should be OK’ after prostate cancer diagnosis

Published

1 year ago

May 20, 2025

A longtime friend of Joe Biden said the family told him Monday the former president would be “OK” after being diagnosed with an aggressive form of prostate cancer.

“I talked to the family. He’s doing good,” said former Rep. Bob Brady (D-Pa.), who has known Biden for decades but has not spoken to the former president directly since the news. “They’re not overly concerned. They think this could all be treated and he should be OK.”

Brady said Biden’s family said “everything looks good” and “they’re figuring out what to do, how they’re gonna treat it, and from what I hear and what they’re saying and what I understand, it’s very treatable, which is great.” He acknowledged that the cancer is “maybe a little aggressive,” but “it doesn’t matter — he’s gonna treat it and he’s gonna be fine.”

Brady did not say which family member or members spoke with him, and an aide didn’t elaborate. A spokesperson for Biden declined to comment.

Biden’s office announced over the weekend that the former president was diagnosed on Friday with prostate cancer with metastasis to the bone. His team said that it is “a more aggressive form of the disease” but that the cancer “appears to be hormone-sensitive which allows for effective management.”

Still, a stage-four prostate cancer diagnosis is serious. Dr. Chris George, a medical director of the cancer program at the Northwestern Health Network, told Reuters that prostate cancer cannot be cured once it reaches the bone, though it can be treated. But, he said, Biden could live for years with effective treatment.

The announcement of Biden’s diagnosis came amid widespread recriminations within the Democratic Party about Biden’s physical and mental condition during his presidency and before he dropped out of the presidential campaign last year. It also coincided with the release of a book on Tuesday arguing that an inner circle kept a diminished Biden shielded from the public. And just last week Axios posted audio clips of Biden’s interview with then-special counsel Robert Hur, in which he struggled to recall key dates.

Brady, 80, and Biden, 82, have been friends for more than 30 years, and their home bases are less than an hour apart. Brady said in 2024 that he talked to Biden almost every week, often about Corvettes. Brady has long called Biden “our senator, even though he’s from Delaware.” After the 2024 election, Brady slammed former Vice President Kamala Harris’ campaign and said Biden would have performed better than her if he’d stayed in the presidential race.

Brady, chair of the Philadelphia Democratic Party, said Biden’s family told him the president would call him after primary elections in his state on Tuesday.

“I call him ‘the boss.’ They said the boss will call you after the election,” he said.

He added of Biden: “I love him to death,” remarking that he “didn’t want to bother me” before the primary.

Politics

World Cup fuels ticketing reform demands

Published

10 hours ago

June 21, 2026

Blue Light Newsroom

Demands are growing for a political reckoning over ticket scams at the World Cup — and beyond.

The National Independent Venue Association and Fan Alliance, organizations representing and advocating for entertainment venues and artists respectively, sent a joint letter to Congress on Thursday, calling on lawmakers to ban speculative and ghost tickets, cases where resellers flog tickets they don’t actually have.

The letter — addressed to Speaker Mike Johnson, Senate Majority Leader John Thune, House Democratic Leader Hakeem Jeffries and Senate Democratic Leader Chuck Schumer — includes nearly two dozen accounts of fans who say they were scammed out of thousands of dollars trying to get tickets to the World Cup, which began last week. The groups are also asking fans to share their own stories with elected officials via the Fix the Tix Fan Action Center that launched last week.

“Every one of these stories erodes the public’s faith that consumers should and will be protected from fraud,” NIVA Executive Director Stephen Parker and Fan Alliance founder Donald Cohen wrote. “We urge Congress to work with us to prevent fraud like this in the future and finally enact ticket resale consumer protections that will protect Americans and ensure affordability.”

The letter flagged fans like Dacy Gillespie, who bought World Cup tickets for her sons on Christmas, only to learn on match day — months later — that the seller couldn’t deliver them. And Skylie Shore, who Parker and Cohen said spent well over $6,000 on tickets to the Scotland-Haiti match on June 13, but was forced to wait outside the stadium because she couldn’t access them as fans marched in on gameday.

“These examples reveal a consistent pattern: consumer deception, speculative ticket sales, and broken-hearted American families at the hands of resale ticketing companies like StubHub,” Parker and Cohen wrote.

In a statement, StubHub spokesperson Jack Sterne said that the platform does not allow speculative ticket sales, and blamed FIFA for users’ difficulty in accessing their tickets.

“We understand that attending the World Cup represents a significant investment in time and money, and we take our responsibility to every fan who books through our platform seriously,” Sterne said in a statement. “Many of the issues fans are facing trace back to the event organizer’s technology infrastructure, newly announced transfer restrictions, and a new app that was launched just a month ago.”

In response, FIFA said in a statement that the organization “can guarantee the validity and delivery of tickets purchased through its official platforms” and that FIFA.com/tickets “is the official ticket sales channel” for the tournament.

NIVA and Fan Alliance are urging congressional leadership to place universal price-gouging limits on ticket resale, enact stringent fines on perpetrators and a violation-reporting mechanism for ticket scams, and require secondary ticketing platforms to produce data on ticket fulfillment and consumer complaints.

The groups are not the only ones monitoring for evidence of shady ticket practices. Missouri Attorney General Catherine Hanaway issued a consumer guidance in advance of the tournament, urging match-goers to beware of fraud and promising to hold offenders accountable. And the FBI in May put out a public service announcement, warning fans against purchasing tickets on copycat websites modeled on FIFA’s.

“With the World Cup coming to Kansas City, excitement is high and, unfortunately, so is the potential for fraud,” Hanaway said in her statement. “Missourians should be able to enjoy this once-in-a-generation event without fear of being deceived. My office will hold accountable anyone who seeks to exploit our families, and we stand ready to assist anyone who encounters suspicious activity.”