It wasn’t until Joe Biden’s X account posted a statement Sunday afternoon that some of the president’s staff found out he would not be running for reelection, Politico reported. But are we sure the post wasn’t news to Joe too?
A few minutes before 2:00 p.m., Biden’s X account posted an image of a letterhead document announcing he would “stand down” from the 2024 campaign. The note said Biden would “speak to the Nation later this week in more detail about my decision.” Half an hour later, a post offered his “full support and endorsement” to Vice President Kamala Harris to be the Democrat nominee.
Biden, who is supposedly dealing with a Covid infection, has yet to be seen alive, much less conduct a press conference. His public schedule indicates he’s been at his Rehoboth Beach house in Deleware since Thursday. Biden’s last address to the nation was one week ago, after former President and Republican nominee Donald Trump survived an assassination attempt.
The only communication America has ostensibly received from the president about his bombshell news is via a social media post. Of course, we all know Biden isn’t actually writing his own tweets. (And not just because they’re coherent sentences.)
During last month’s presidential debate — at which Biden displayed his mental inability to govern the country right now, much less convince Americans to let him stay in the White House for four more years — Biden’s X account made more than 20 posts. Obviously, Biden wasn’t composing messages from the stage. No one was trying to hide the fact that some unnamed staffer was hitting “send” on each corny post while the president withered at the debate podium.
But that raises the very important question: Who hit send on Sunday afternoon’s announcement? No one believes it was actually Joe. Sure, the letter included a signature, but coming from the office that probably owns more signature stamps than any other executive in the country, you can decide what that’s worth. Does Joe Biden even know he’s not running for president anymore?
Biden wasn’t the one who broke the news to his own Cabinet on Sunday. Politico reported that Biden’s chief of staff, Jeff Zients, “has managed much of the communication across an anxious administration, holding calls Sunday afternoon with both the Cabinet and senior White House staffers.” Zients will also “hold an all-staff White House call on Monday morning.” (Supposedly, Biden called Zients, Harris, his campaign chair, and other advisers.)
It’s not like the announcement was made at 8:00 p.m., after the president had been tucked into bed. If Joe Biden is coherent enough to govern a global superpower for another six months, he can tell Americans about his decision to their faces. The last we heard from Biden, on camera, he was clearly intending to remain the Democrat nominee.
The post from Biden’s X account promised he would address the country “later this week” about the decision. Until he does, the country will be forced to wonder if he even knows it was made.
Elle Purnell is the elections editor at The Federalist. Her work has been featured by Fox Business, RealClearPolitics, the Tampa Bay Times, and the Independent Women’s Forum. She received her B.A. in government from Patrick Henry College with a minor in journalism. Follow her on Twitter @_etreynolds.
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