as a reporter I have a confession to make I should have pushed harder earlier for more information about Joe Biden's mental and physical well-being and any signs of decline so let me explain um Joe Biden was president from 2020 to 2024 I worked at CNN through 2022 um during that time the the early part when I was at CNN 2020 to 20 22 people would regularly Republicans would regular regularly ping me and say why don't you ask more questions of Joe Biden and how he's doing he's 76 77 78y old man and I would sort
of brush them off because what I would say is well there's no obvious evidence that he's declining yeah he moves a little slower he talks a little slower but there's no evidence that he's declining and and the White House and the people around Joe Biden were absolutely adamant that suggesting anything asking the question about whether he was in some physical mental or both decline was offensive how could you it's AG shaming and I think that impacted me at some level because while I did ask the question from time to time of you know not directly
the White House but AIDS and and people around in that orbit I didn't really push on it uh if I'm being honest now once I left CNN and once it became a little bit more clear to me about Biden's age I think I did write pretty regularly and talk pretty regularly about how I wasn't sure that this guy was up to it and then obviously after the June 27th debate everybody including me was writing and talking about it um the reason that I bring this up is in the last 48 hours there have been two
stories one by the New York Times uh and one by the Wall Street Journal that document um the decline of Joe Biden um and uh how we probably should have known then and reported then what we know now so let me just um let me just read a little bit of the uh Wall Street Journal piece which is based off of 50 50 5 that's me drawing it for some unknown reason 50 interviews with people in and around Biden uh I'm just going to read a bit to adapt the White House around the needs of
a diminished leader they told visitors to keep meetings focused interactions with senior Democratic lawmakers and some cabinet members including powerful secretaries such as defenses Lloyd Austin and treasury's Janet Yellen were infrequent or grew less frequent some legislative leaders had a hard time getting the presidency here at Key moments including ahead of the US's disastrous pull out from Afghanistan senior advisers are often put into roles at some administration of officials and lawmakers thought Biden should occupy with people such as National Security adviser Jake Sullivan senior counselor Steve Rett and National Economic Council head Leo brainer and
her predecessor frequently in the position of Being go-betweens for the president press AIDS who compiled packages of news clips for Biden were told by senior staff to exclude negative stories about the president the president wasn't talking to his own pollsters as survey surveys showed him trailing in the 2024 race um that sorry I'm looking up the uh New York Times piece because I want a quote from the New York Times piece as well uh that is pretty damning then there's this the headline New York Times this is earlier this week a weary a weary Biden
heads for the exits this is the Twilight of Mr Biden's presidency the final days of the final chapter of an epic half-century political Journey that has more than its share of twists and turns time is catching up with Mr Biden he looks a little older and a little slower with each passing day aids say he remains plenty sharp in the Situation Room calling world leaders to broker a ceasefire in Lebanon or a deal with the chaos of Syria's Rebellion but it is hard to imagine that he seriously thought he could do the world's most stressful
job for another four years okay I know that's a lot of text that I read but that's what's got me thinking about the fact that I probably should have pushed harder on the Biden age stuff um because in retrospect it's clear that the people close to him knew that at best he had some good days and some bad days um June 27th the debate clearly was a bad day but if the bad day was that bad as bad as he performed on that debate stage the fact that he had been president without a whole lot
of questions being asked about his physical and mental Decline and I'll add the fact that he continued to be president from June 27th until January 20th 2025 I I think is a little bit concerning and begs the question of like what when did people near him know what did they know and why did they not share I get protecting um Biden's privacy but he's the president in the United States right like this isn't this isn't just your grandpa who you want to like take the keys from but you're not to his car but you're not
totally sure how to approach it this is the sitting president of the United States who will continue to be after June 27th was the president for another six months um and we don't know how far far back signs of this physical and mental decline went and again I don't put it just on myself or or just on journalists cuz I know journalists did ask and I can tell you I mean I know from my experience there was a shame factor that went into that people around Biden worked to make you feel bad when you asked
whether he would was up to the job of running of being president running for president again and serving as president for another four years how could you uh you know and they did a very good job at least until they couldn't hide it anymore of hiding it of uh making it so that it was very hard to know yes but he didn't do a lot of press conference yes he didn't do a lot of media interviews but you know when he did things the thing I always remembers he gave the State of the Union speech
this earlier this year and he was fine um there were no obvious signs of the CL I mean yes he looked like a 70 you know an 80y old guy but he didn't it didn't I wasn't like this man cannot in under no circumstances be president so they did a good job of hiding it for a long time but journalists and I put myself here you've got to we we should have been pushier uh we should have I should have I don't want to speak for everyone I should have not let the shame campaign to
make you feel bad for asking the question get to me um because it's now clear from both the Wall Street Journal and the New York Times piece that there was real deterioration even before and by the way all the reporting that we've seen since the June 27th debate it's not just these two stories that there was real and significant decline in Joe Biden and that it was being managed by the people around him they were insulating him they were keeping sort of the world the political world out and keeping him sort of bunkered in and
that should have been something we knew more about now you know you can argue all what does it matter Biden eventually got out of the race it's not like he sure sure but he been the president for the last four years so it's critically important and we've learned by the way you know questions about presidential Health mental and physical health whether it's Ronald Reagan or Kennedy or FDR we've seen a lot of that Trump um you know we've seen a lot of this where there is a lack of transparency so we need to learn our
lesson I think um you know we Donald Donald Trump's going to come into office in his late 70s we know very little about his medical history I think we as journalists need to keep asking questions have you seen any signs of his me mental or physical decline now his AIDS may just say no he's great 100% but keep digging uh if there are those signs there will be the people who are worried about it and we should have gotten to those people with Biden more and more frequently to accurate accurately represent what was happening in
the white house and then let the public make up their own mind but I think at least for the first couple years of his presidency maybe the first three years the image of him as a older but hail and Hearty older man prevailed and I'm not sure based on these two stories the journal story and the time story I'll link to both uh below but also just all the reporting we've seen since June 27th since the debate I'm not sure that that was an accurate in fact I don't think at all that was an accurate
depiction of his physical and mental state uh even if he had good days and bad days well he had bad days and those bad days were pretty bad and when you're the president of the United States you don't get to have good days and bad days you got to have a consistently good in terms of your mental cognitive abilities your physical abilities you got to have good days um and so I think it's a lesson that we have to learn going forward because again Donald Trump will be the oldest person ever to hold the office
if he serves for 4 years um and I will be mindful of that because again asking those questions isn't a partisan thing asking those questions is a journalism thing and I should have pushed harder um and not been as willing to accept the now he's fine look at him when he's in public campaign and I did um anyway I'm always want to be as authentic honest and transparent with you as possible this is part of that effort um four things subscribe to this channel uh like this video comment on this video tell 10 friends about
my Channel all right everybody take care
