Biden Publicly Acknowledges Seventh Grandchild for the First Time: ‘This Is Not a Political Issue’

President Biden publicly acknowledged Hunter Biden’s child born out of wedlock as his seventh grandchild for the first time in a statement on Friday after weeks of criticism over his failure to include the four-year-old girl in his family.

Navy Joan Roberts was born in 2018 after the younger Biden had an affair with former stripper Lunden Roberts. A 2020 paternity test proved he was in fact the father. Roberts initially sought to have her daughter take the Biden name but eventually agreed to drop her demand as part of a settlement last month, while Hunter Biden agreed to give the girl a number of his paintings that have sold for a questionable amount of money.

“Our son Hunter and Navy’s mother, Lunden, are working together to foster a relationship that is in the best interests of their daughter, preserving her privacy as much as possible going forward,” President Biden said in a statement to People magazine on Friday.

“This is not a political issue, it’s a family matter,” Biden added. “Jill and I only want what is best for all of our grandchildren, including Navy.”

Biden set off a firestorm in late April when he said he has “six grandchildren and I’m crazy about them — I speak to them every single day; not a joke.” The comment ignored his seventh grandchild, Navy.

New York Times columnist Maureen Dowd wrote an essay earlier this month criticizing how the president has handled the situation: “It’s Seven Grandkids, Mr. President.”

“Joe Biden’s mantra has always been that ‘the absolute most important thing is your family.’ It is the heart of his political narrative. Empathy, born of family tragedies, has been his stock in trade. Callously scarring Navy’s life, just as it gets started, undercuts that,” she wrote.

White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre had previously shut down questions about the situation during press briefings. When asked if Biden acknowledges the girl as his granddaughter, she said: “I don’t have anything to share from here.”

Sources reportedly told NBC News’s Kelly O’Donnell that the president now intends to say he has seven grandchildren going forward.