Biden wanted to freeze the federal budget. That equates to cutting SS and Medicare benefits.

[OilemFirchen]

49. Here's video of the entirety of that speech:

https://www.c-span.org/video/?c4468932/user-clip-senator-biden

Context is important. This was during a government shutdown, when the Republicans were attempting to pass a Balanced Budget Amendment. There was a budget crisis, and, while Senator Biden did say that he supported a freeze that included "everything", he explicitly stated that the Republican-proposed legislation was subterfuge for their relentless attempt to do away with entitlement spending.

Remember, as well, that this marked a protracted period during which some asserted that a failure to increase spending was the same as a spending cut. A spending freeze could only affect entitlements in that regard, so it's likely that the Senator had proposed - as a compromise to the Republicans' attempt to literally cut entitlements (through the only mechanism available - a constitutional amendment), a freeze on COLAs.

There may be a transcript of this speech, but, as this was also user-submitted, C-SPAN doesn't link to one. If you're interested in this issue, however, a full viewing of the video is useful, especially the latter part where he explicitly corrects himself about "cuts" to SS and discusses compromise "cuts" to Medicare (probably, again, as they pertained to proposed increases in spending, like expanded coverage or reduced premiums).