WASHINGTON — Naomi Biden, the granddaughter of former President Joe Biden, tore into a new book that has sparked renewed attention on the former Democratic commander in chief's cognitive state during his time in office ahead of its release on Tuesday. 


What You Need To Know

  • Naomi Biden, the granddaughter of former President Joe Biden, tore into a new book that has sparked renewed attention on the former Democratic commander in chief's cognitive state during his time in office ahead of its release on Tuesday
  • In a post on X one day ahead of the book’s public release, Naomi Biden chalked it up to “political fairy smut for the permanent, professional chattering class," asserting it is full of "lies"
  • The book, titled “Original Sin: President Biden's Decline, Its Cover-Up, and His Disastrous Choice to Run Again,” and authored by CNN anchor Jake Tapper and Axios reporter Alex Thompson, seeks to shed light on what they say was the former president’s decline while in office and an effort behind the scenes to shield others from knowing about it
  • The announcement over the weekend that Joe Biden has been diagnosed with prostate cancer that has spread to his bones added another layer to the conversation

In a post on X one day ahead of the book’s public release, Naomi Biden, who noted she experienced her grandfather’s presidency first-hand, chalked it up to “political fairy smut for the permanent, professional chattering class.”

She went on to assert that the book is full of “lies” and accused the journalists who wrote it of being motivated by money. 

“Put simply, it amounts to a bunch of unoriginal, uninspired lies written by irresponsible self promoting journalists out to make a quick buck,” wrote Naomi Biden, who got married at the White House during her grandfather’s time in office. 

Naomi Biden also specifically condemned the book’s use of anonymous sources and appeared to throw in a criticism of President Donald Trump with a reference to what she called the “current national nightmare.”

The book, titled “Original Sin: President Biden's Decline, Its Cover-Up, and His Disastrous Choice to Run Again,” and authored by CNN anchor Jake Tapper and Axios reporter Alex Thompson, seeks to shed light on what they say was the former president’s decline while in office and an effort behind the scenes to shield others from knowing about it. 

The topic was frequently focused on by Republicans during Joe Biden’s time in office and reached a pinnacle during his June debate with Trump in which the then-president stumbled, mixed up words and appeared confused at times, ultimately paving the way for him to drop his reelection bid. 

Since he left office and handed the reins back over to Trump, new reporting, such as Tapper and Thompson’s book, as well as  the release of audio of an interview Joe Biden did with former special counsel Robert Hur, has revived the conversation around the former president’s cognitive abilities while occupying the White House. At the time of the report, Hur said jurors would likely find the then-president to be a “a sympathetic, well-meaning, elderly man with a poor memory."

The announcement over the weekend that Joe Biden has been diagnosed with prostate cancer that has spread to his bones added another layer to the conversation. While those across the political spectrum have expressed well-wishes for the former president in light of the news, some Republicans, including Trump, have raised questions about how the “aggressive” form of cancer was not discovered or made public earlier. 

All of it has also left some Democrats, particularly those who defended him, facing tough questions about their experiences interacting with the former Democratic president and whether he should have run for reelection. 

In her post, the former president’s granddaughter also lauded her grandfather’s morals, proclaiming that he will be remembered well in history. 

“All of this at the expense of a man so completely good and honest that it is impossible for these people to ever understand the why or how of it all,” she wrote. “I suspect history will reward the truth.”

For his part, Joe Biden, as recently as this month during an appearance on ABC’s “The View,” has maintained that conversations about his mental decline, and particularly the books that have come out since he dropped out of the race reportedly detailing it, are “wrong.” He says he decided to exit the 2024 election because he wanted to keep the Democratic party unified.