‘Dilbert’ cartoonist announces he has the same kind of cancer as former President Joe Biden

The 82-year-old former president and his family are reviewing treatment options with his physicians. (CNN, POOL, AMERICAN CANCER SOCIETY, X @KAMALAHARRIS)
Published: May 20, 2025 at 6:27 AM CDT
Email This Link
Share on Pinterest
Share on LinkedIn

(AP) - The creator of the Dilbert comic strip, which was canceled by most newspapers two years ago over the creator’s racist comments, said Monday that he has been diagnosed with the same aggressive prostate cancer as former President Joe Biden.

FILE - The creator of the “Dilbert” comic strip, which was canceled by most newspapers two...
FILE - The creator of the “Dilbert” comic strip, which was canceled by most newspapers two years ago over the creator's racist comments, says he has been diagnosed with the same aggressive prostate cancer as former President Joe Biden.(Associated Press)

“I have the same cancer that Joe Biden has,” Scott Adams said Monday during an episode of his YouTube show, “Real Coffee with Scott Adams. “So, I also have prostate cancer that has also spread to my bones.”

He made the announcement after extending his “respect and comion and sympathy” for Biden and his family. Biden announced his diagnosis on Sunday and said he and his family were reviewing treatment options with his doctors.

Adams, 67, said he’s always in pain, uses a walker to get around and that he expects to die sometime this summer.

“It’s basically intolerable,” he said of the pain.

Adams said he has had time to process his diagnosis and that it has given him time to say goodbyes, get his affairs in order and do all the things he needed to do.

Dilbert the comic strip first appeared in 1989, poking fun at office culture. It ran for decades in numerous newspapers but disappeared with lightning speed in 2023 following racist remarks by Adams.

On his YouTube show at the time, among other things, he described Black people as a “hate group” and said he would no longer “help Black Americans.”

He later said he was being hyperbolic, yet continued to defend his stance.

Various media publishers across the U.S. denounced the comments as racist, hateful and discriminatory while saying they would no longer provide a platform for his work.

The editor of the San Francisco Chronicle, which dumped “Dilbert” in 2022, said the comic strip “went from being hilarious to being hurtful and mean.”

The former president was diagnosed with the “aggressive” form of cancer on Friday.

Biden’s office said his cancer “appears to be hormone sensitive, which allows for effective management.”