The Home Oversight and Authorities Reform Committee has secured interviews with 4 former high aides to former President Biden in its probe of his psychological acuity.
Over August and September, the panel will hear from former Biden press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre, White Home counsel workplace spokesperson Ian Sams, senior deputy press secretary Andrew Bates, and chief of employees Jeff Zients.
Home Oversight Committee Chair James Comer (R-Ky.) had requested conferences with the officers earlier this month. Biden has denied he struggled with psychological health whereas in workplace.
“The scope of your responsibilities—both official and otherwise—and personal interactions within the Oval Office cannot go without investigation, given the mounting evidence that President Biden was incapacitated for much, if not all, of his single term,” Comer wrote in letters to each Sams and Bates requesting the interview.
“If White House staff carried out a strategy lasting months or even years to hide the chief executive’s condition—or to perform his duties—Congress may need to consider a legislative response.”
A Biden ally mentioned the investigation was a part of a broader try to make use of congressional energy to each assault the previous president and attempt to undermine choices he made whereas in workplace.
Jean-Pierre was press secretary for Biden on the top of scrutiny about Biden’s psychological health, particularly within the wake of his disastrous debate efficiency final yr and strain for him to drop out of the 2024 race.
The previous press secretary mentioned in early June that she was leaving the Democratic Occasion and switched her political affiliation to unbiased. She plans to write down a e-book about Biden’s choice to desert his bid for a second time period, which can element her time in what she described as a “broken” White Home.
Bates labored for Biden all through his 4 years in workplace and was a number one spokesperson pushing again on reporting suggesting that the previous president’s well being had declined, together with in December 2024, when The Wall Road Journal printed an article about how Biden’s aides managed his rising limitations.
Sams was the lead spokesperson responding to Comer’s calls to question Biden in 2023 and have become the spokesperson for former Vice President Kamala Harris’s marketing campaign as soon as the previous president dropped out of the race.
Zients was Biden’s second chief of employees and was employed in January 2023 to exchange Biden’s longtime aide and former chief of employees Ron Klain, who is ready to take a seat with the panel later this month.
Comer has advised aides wrongly used an autopen to signal issues on Biden’s behalf — one thing the previous president has immediately denied.
“I made every decision,” Biden mentioned in an interview with The New York Instances, including that an autopen was solely used to approve grants of clemency as a result of “we’re talking about a whole lot of people.”
“Everybody knows how vindictive he is, so we knew that they’d do what they’re doing now,” Biden mentioned. “I consciously made all those decisions.”
Biden mentioned he did so to guard deserving figures, citing a preemptive pardon given to Gen. Mark Milley for instance.
“We know how vindictive Trump is and I’ve no doubt they would have gone after Mark for no good reason,” Biden mentioned. “The general, you know. So they may read off his name — what’d I want? I told them I wanted to make sure he had a pardon because I knew exactly what Trump would do — without any merit, I might add.”
Alex Gangitano contributed.
