Stunning revelations in a new report allege that President Joe Biden’s meetings with his cabinet secretaries were “pre-scripted.”
The CNN report published Thursday pulled back the curtain on meetings with the president. citing two sources with direct knowledge that it is “customary” for White House aides to receive questions and “key talking points” submitted by Biden’s cabinet secretaries ahead of any meetings with the 81-year-old commander-in-chief.
“The entire display is kind of an act,” one of the sources told CNN. “They would come and say, ‘Hey, the president is going to call on you about 25 minutes in, and ask this question. What are the bullet points you’ll respond with?’”
The meetings are “not free-wheeling” and they are “pretty well-orchestrated,” according to the second source.
“And the meetings themselves are infrequent, with one Cabinet secretary telling CNN they are uncertain of Biden’s condition because they so rarely see him.,” the report indicated. “In fact, the last full Cabinet meeting took place on October 2, 2023. Sources also said Cabinet meetings during the Obama years, which Biden attended as vice president, were not pre-scripted this way.”
More than “two dozen current and former Democratic officials, donors and longtime Biden allies” spoke with the outlet for the report, remaining anonymous “to avoid alienating Biden and discuss sensitive health matters verboten by the White House.”
“While it’s clear the president had aged in the past year, none of them said they had seen the version of Biden, faltering and dazed, that showed up at last month’s debate,” CNN reported, adding that many of these sources held the president’s family and closest advisers responsible for “a painstakingly choreographed daily operation designed to prevent him from being in unscripted settings for extended periods of time.”
One top Democrat who is connected to the inner circle of advisers told CNN, “There’s this general sense of just, unbelievable holding your breath every time he does an event, every time he’s with people.”
“Everyone who expresses any level of suspicion or contrary views? They call everyone and they beat the s*** out of them and say: ‘Stay on message,” the Democrat said.
Some of the advisers have privately admitted: “This is going to get worse.”
White House spokesman Andrew Bates defended the president.
“Joe Biden has always said that it is fair for reporters to ask about his age and has always confidently shown his values, agenda, intelligence, and determination to the American people,” Bates said. “Officials who meet with him frequently have spoken to his sharpness and command.”
Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack, who also served under President Barack Obama, said in a statement that what CNN reported is “standard practice for any administration” because “there should not be surprise in Cabinet meetings.”