White House Responds to 'Cheat Sheet' Controversy With Laughable Gaslighting

AP Photo/Evan Vucci

On Wednesday, Joe Biden was caught with his worst “cheat sheet” yet while doing a joint press conference with South Korean President Yoon Suk Yeol.

The internet was set ablaze after Biden was pictured with a piece of paper containing reporter Courtney Subramanian’s picture, name, and a formal question. Written at the top in a box were the words “Question #1.”  Subramanian works for the left-wing newspaper The Los Angeles Times and has denied that she pre-submitted the question shown.

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Karine Jean-Pierre was actually asked about the controversy at Thursday’s White House briefing, and right on cue, she delivered a laughable amount of gaslighting (The New York Post).

White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre claimed Thursday it was “entirely normal” for President Biden to be holding a cheat sheet with advance knowledge of a journalist’s question at a joint press conference — even as she denied that was what happened.

“It is entirely normal for a president to be briefed on reporters who will be asking questions at a press conference and issues that we expect they might ask about,” Jean-Pierre told members of the White House press corps at her regular briefing.

“It is not surprising that yesterday we would anticipate questions that he did receive — right? — on the visit with the South Korean president [Wednesday],” the press secretary went on.

“We do not have specific questions in advance, that’s not something that we do,” Jean-Pierre added — despite that fact that her own briefings have been heavily pre-scripted for months, with an aide generally canvassing reporters for their questions ahead of time and the press secretary then declining to call on those who balk.

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Did you get all that? You are supposed to believe that the White House has such incredible foresight that they can ascertain specific questions from reporters beforehand with absolute accuracy. Keep in mind, what was written on that paper wasn’t a few topical suggestions of what the reporter might ask, which would better match Jean-Pierre’s explanation. Rather, it was a specific question complete with “you” and “your” capitalized so Biden could understand exactly what was being asked. That’s not something that is randomly done in the hope that a reporter will ask a question in that exact way.

In short, Jean-Pierre’s claim makes no sense. What good would it do to put a random, supposedly made-up question down on the president’s cheat sheet that he’s using during the press conference? It’d be one thing if he were given a variety of questions Subramanian could ask prior to showing up, but for a single, extremely specific question to show up on his day-of notes doesn’t begin to pass muster.

But let’s say Jean-Pierre is being truthful about all this (extremely doubtful). What does it say about Biden’s mental capabilities if he needs to have his hand held to such an extent just to answer two questions at a formal press conference? The answer is that it says lots and lots of bad things. The president is not with us anymore, and it’s so obvious when he appears in public that it’s downright uncomfortable to witness. Prepping for a presser is one thing. What’s on that paper he was caught with is another, and simply proclaiming the sky to not be blue isn’t going to cut it.

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