Latest news with #OriginalSin:President
New York Post
a day ago
- Health
- New York Post
House GOP subpoenas Biden doctor, sets sights on Karine Jean-Pierre
WASHINGTON — House Oversight Committee Chairman James Comer issued a subpoena Thursday to force Joe Biden's doctor, Kevin O'Connor, to appear for questions about the alleged cover-up of the ex-president's mental decline — and plans to invite Karine Jean-Pierre to appear after she divulged plans for a tell-all book about the 'broken' administration she served as press secretary. Dr. O'Connor refused to sit for a transcribed interview, citing patient-doctor confidentiality, but will now be called in for a grilling on June 27, according to the subpoena. 'In lieu of full compliance, your counsel suggest a set of written interrogatories that would afford them as well as an unnamed medical ethics expert the ability to 'closely evaluate' your answers,' Comer (R-Ky.) wrote to O'Connor. 'This is not acceptable and will not satisfy the Committee's legitimate oversight and legislative needs. Considering these facts, the attached subpoena is now necessary.' 3 Getty Images A source familiar with the House investigation said that the panel expects Jean-Pierre to be invited to give testimony as well — after she said Wednesday that she had left the Democratic Party and plans to release 'Independent: A Look Inside a Broken White House, Outside the Party Lines' on Oct. 21. 3 David Lienemann/The White House 3 REUTERS O'Connor is the first person to be subpoenaed by Comer as part of his investigation of Biden's mental decline and the alleged concealment of his slipping health. Comer initially sought the doctor's testimony about 'the circumstances surrounding your assessment in February 2024 that former President Biden was 'a healthy, active, robust 81- year-old male, who remains fit to successfully execute the duties of the Presidency.'' The chairman noted in his latest communication that his committee also was interested in 'whether your financial relationship with the Biden family affected your assessment of former President Biden's physical and mental fitness to fulfill his duties as President.' 'Given your connections with the Biden family, the Committee sought to understand if you contributed to an effort to hide former President Biden's fitness to serve from the American people,' he wrote. The oversight panel is in talks with attorneys for four other Biden aides about their potential testimony, including first lady Jill Biden's former chief of staff Anthony Bernal and the president's former West Wing aides Annie Tomasini, Neera Tanden and Ashley Williams. On Wednesday, Comer also requested appearances by former White House chief of staff Ron Klain, former de facto West Wing communications chief Anita Dunn and longtime Biden advisers Bruce Reed, Mike Donilon and Steve Ricchetti. Biden has brushed off claims that he was mentally fading while in office and last week suggested he was fit enough to beat up journalists Jake Tapper and Alex Thompson, the co-authors of 'Original Sin: President Biden's Decline, Its Cover-up, and His Disastrous Choice to Run Again.' 'You can see that I'm mentally incompetent and I can't walk and I can beat the hell out of both of them,' Biden bristled May 30 following remarks in his home state of Delaware — his first public appearance since the May 18 announcement he had been diagnosed with prostate cancer that had spread to his bones.
The Hill
2 days ago
- Politics
- The Hill
Trump orders probe of Biden mental state, executive actions in office
President Trump on Wednesday ordered an investigation into actions taken by then-President Biden, citing questions about Biden's cognitive state toward the end of his term. Trump directed the counsel to the president, in consultation with Attorney General Pam Bondi, to probe 'whether certain individuals conspired to deceive the public about Biden's mental state and unconstitutionally exercise the authorities and responsibilities of the President.' The investigation will focus specifically on actions Biden signed using the 'autopen,' which has become a fixation of those on the right as they levy accusations about Biden's ability to carry out his duties. Trump's order cites Biden's appointment of more than 200 judges to the federal bench, the issuance of thousands of acts of clemency and the issuance of more than 1,000 presidential documents during his term. Biden and his aides have repeatedly denied that the former president was unable to carry out his duties while in office. A Biden spokesperson did not immediately respond to a request for comment about Trump's latest order. New books, including 'Original Sin: President Biden's Decline, Its Cover-Up, and His Disastrous Choice to Run Again,' have reignited debate about Biden's mental acuity while in office and whether he experienced cognitive decline. Since President Trump took office, the GOP has taken a number of steps focusing on Biden. The White House confirmed Tuesday that pardon attorney Ed Martin would be reviewing Biden's pardons for his family members, as well as some other clemencies granted during his final days in office. House Republicans have reached out to former Biden aides as part of a probe into the former president's mental acuity. And the Justice Department last month released the full tapes of Biden's interview with special counsel Robert Hur, one in which the attorney said Biden appeared to have memory lapses. While president, Biden released the full transcript of the conversation.
Yahoo
3 days ago
- General
- Yahoo
Trump DOJ reviewing Biden pardons
The Department of Justice is reviewing pardons doled out under former President Biden, citing concerns about whether Biden himself was making decisions about clemency power, a senior administration official confirmed to The Hill. The official told The Hill that pardon attorney Ed Martin will lead an independent review to determine if 'unelected staffers' took advantage of Biden when it came to pardons and commutations. 'The American people deserve to know the extent to which unelected staffers and an autopen acted as a proxy president due to the incompetence and infirmity of the previous president,' White House spokesperson Harrison Fields said in a statement. 'President Trump was elected to restore the integrity and transparency of the office, and answering the question of who was actually running this country for four years is well within the president's rights.' Martin was originally Trump's choice to serve as the top prosecutor in the District of Columbia. His nomination was dropped in the face of Republican opposition in the Senate over his ties to the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the Capitol. The pardon review comes as fresh reporting and new books, including 'Original Sin: President Biden's Decline, Its Cover-Up, and His Disastrous Choice to Run Again,' have reignited debate about Biden's mental acuity while in office and whether he experienced cognitive decline. It also comes as Jesse Jackson Jr., Michael Cohen and others who were denied pardons under Biden have called on Trump to re-examine the cases of those who did not have their applications approved during the previous administration. A Biden spokesperson told The Hill that the former president and his team thoughtfully reviewed requests for pardons and commutations and pointed to Biden issuing more than 2,500 individual acts of clemency. Biden allies have more broadly pushed back on claims that the former president was not carrying out his duties while in office. Biden issued more than 80 pardons during his four years in office, and he commuted the sentences of thousands of people. The vast majority of his acts of clemency were granted to nonviolent offenders, including numerous individuals who had been charged with nonviolent drug offenses. But some of his more controversial uses of the pardon power came toward the end of his term. Biden granted a full pardon to his son, Hunter Biden, who had been found guilty on federal gun charges and pleaded guilty to federal tax charges. Hunter Biden had been a political target for Republicans throughout his father's time in office. The 46th president also granted blanket pardons in the final moments of his term to five family members and several former government officials who had been the targets of political attacks from Trump and his allies. Reuters, which first reported the investigation, reviewed an email from Martin saying he was directed to launch the probe, though did not specify by whom. The outlet reported that Martin would focus on the family pardons as well as death row clemencies. On his last day as interim U.S. Attorney for D.C., Martin said that he would give particular scrutiny to pardons given to Biden family members. 'They need scrutiny because we want pardons to matter and to be accepted and to be something that's used correctly. So I do think we're going to take a hard look at how they went and what they did,' Martin said at a press conference last month. Martin is not only the pardon attorney, but was also tapped to lead the Weaponization Working Group, a new task force established by Attorney General Pam Bondi. Trump's actions have further exacerbated questions about presidential clemency power and how it can disproportionately benefit those with connections to the administration. Trump during his first term used clemency powers on political allies such as Paul Manafort, Steve Bannon, Roger Stone and Michael Flynn. Trump also pardoned nearly all Jan. 6 defendants on his first day back in office this year. Updated 2:23 p.m. Copyright 2025 Nexstar Media, Inc. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.
New York Post
29-05-2025
- Politics
- New York Post
Comer ‘open' to calling Biden for hearing on cognitive state
House Oversight Committee Chairman James Comer said Wednesday he was 'open' to dragging former President Joe Biden before the panel as part of his probe into the 82-year-old's cognitive state and use of an autopen. Despite not ruling the possibility out, Comer (R-Ky.) wondered during an appearance on Fox News' 'Hannity' whether it would 'even be worthwhile' to bring the 46th president before the powerful investigative committees. 'We're going to see who was giving the directive to sign these,' Comer said. 'If everyone says it was Joe Biden, then I'm certainly open to bring him in.' Advertisement Last week, Comer's team blasted out letters to five confidants of the former president — including ex-White House doctor Kevin O'Connor — demanding interviews for an investigation into Biden's mental and physical decline. All five have since made initial contact with the panel. 3 House Oversight Committee Chairman James Comer was noncommittal about bringing the former president before the committee. CQ-Roll Call, Inc via Getty Images 3 Former President Joe Biden dealt with tough investigations from James Comer during the latter half of his presidency. Getty Images Advertisement No former president has given sworn testimony before Congress since Gerald Ford in 1983. The since-defunct House select committee investigating the Jan. 6, 2021, Capitol riot subpoenaed President Trump for testimony in 2022, but he declined to appear. 'Look, I would love to ask Joe Biden a lot of questions, but right now, we're starting with the staffers who were operating the autopen,' Comer went on. 'We're going to bring the physician, Dr. O'Connor, in because he definitely was not telling the truth about Joe Biden's health.' The chairman added that Republicans will be assisted by Rep. Ronny Jackson (R-Texas), a former White House doctor who held the role during the Obama and first Trump administrations. 3 The former president has largely laid low in public since his White House departure. Getty Images Advertisement Comer also hinted that Republicans could pursue ex-first son Hunter Biden, former first lady Jill Biden and former White House chief of staff Ron Klain. The probe comes amid rekindled uproar over Biden's mental acuity and fitness for office following the release of the book 'Original Sin: President Biden's Decline, Its Cover-Up, and His Disastrous Choice to Run Again' and the 46th president's May 18 announcement that he had prostate cancer that spread to his bones.
Yahoo
25-05-2025
- Politics
- Yahoo
Biden's chief of staff scolded Obama campaign architect for calling Biden's age an issue, book reveals
Former President Joe Biden's decision to run for re-election divided longtime Democratic advisors, a new book about Biden's cognitive decline and his administration's alleged cover-up revealed. Biden's former Chief of Staff, Ron Klain, shut down former President Barack Obama advisor David Axelrod for repeatedly calling Biden's age an issue. "The presidency is a monstrously taxing job and the stark reality is the president would be closer to 90 than 80 at the end of a second term, and that would be a major issue," Axelrod told The New York Times. Soon after the Times' story was published in June 2022, Klain called Axelrod fuming, CNN anchor Jake Tapper and Axios political correspondent Alex Thompson revealed in their book, "Original Sin: President Biden's Decline, Its Cover-Up, and His Disastrous Choice to Run Again." Biden Struggled To Film 2024 Campaign Videos Amid Declining Health, New Book Claims: 'The Man Could Not Speak' "Who's going to beat Trump? President Biden is the only one who has done it. You better have a lot of certainty about a different candidate before you say the president should step aside. The future of the country depends on it!" Klain told Axelrod on the phone, according to Thompson and Tapper. Read On The Fox News App Fox News' Peter Doocy Reveals History Of Questioning Biden's Mental Fitness Klain believed it was "sloppy thinking" that anyone other than Biden could beat Trump, the journalists said in the book. But Axelrod, like most Americans, worried about the first octogenarian president's age and his ability to serve four more years. The chief strategist for Obama's back-to-back winning campaigns, Axelrod was one of the last advisers to meet with Biden before Obama chose him as his running mate in 2008. Axelrod told Tapper and Thompson that they didn't expect Biden to run for president at 73 and eventually discouraged Biden from running for president in 2015. They certainly didn't expect Biden to run for president at 77. After Axelrod made some friendly comments about Biden to a reporter in 2018, Biden invited him to his rental home in Virginia, according to the book. "He was stunned by how much Biden had aged," Tapper and Thompson wrote. Axelrod told Biden that age would be an issue for his campaign but encouraged him to lean on his experience and wisdom, the journalists said. Axelrod's apprehension about Biden's age only grew, and when it came time for Biden to make a decision about his re-election, he knew Biden shouldn't run in 2024. The longtime political advisor told Tapper and Thompson he wished someone in the White House had "come to their senses and [convinced] Biden and his family that this just wasn't tenable." Pointing to unfavorable battleground polls from 2023, Axelrod encouraged Biden to drop out of the race in a series of social media posts. He said the "stakes of miscalculation here are too dramatic to ignore." "Only @JoeBiden can make this decision. If he continues to run, he will be the nominee of the Democratic Party. What he needs to decide is whether that is wise; whether it's in HIS best interest or the country's?" Axelrod questioned on social media. Klain fired back, this time for the public to see: "Man who called Biden 'Mr Magoo' in Aug 2019 is still at it," in reference to Axelrod's comments following the 2019 Democratic presidential primary debate. An excerpt from the book reads: "In response to Axelrod's 2023 post, Biden called Axelrod a 'prick' – a private insult until someone leaked it to Jonathan Martin of Politico. Axelrod received confidential messages of agreement from prominent Democrats who remained silent, they explained, because they were resigned to Biden's candidacy and did not want to weaken him as a looming rematch with Trump approached." Fox News Digital has written extensively, dating back to the 2020 presidential campaign, about Biden's cognitive decline and his inner circle's role in covering it up. "There is nothing in this book that shows Joe Biden failed to do his job, as the authors have alleged, nor did they prove their allegation that there was a cover-up or conspiracy," a Biden spokesperson told Fox News Digital. "Nowhere do they show that our national security was threatened or where the president wasn't otherwise engaged in the important matters of the presidency. In fact, Joe Biden was an effective president who led our country with empathy and skill."Original article source: Biden's chief of staff scolded Obama campaign architect for calling Biden's age an issue, book reveals
