White House press briefings under Karine Jean-Pierre may be over, but the aftershocks are still being felt — and reporters are finally speaking up.
In the wake of Original Sin, the new book exposing the full extent of President Joe Biden’s mental decline and the coordinated effort by his inner circle to cover it up, members of the press corps are pulling back the curtain on what they endured from Biden’s notoriously combative communications team. And it wasn’t pretty.
Fox News Senior White House Correspondent Jacqui Heinrich, who’s no stranger to asking tough questions in the briefing room, described the environment as hostile and openly abusive. During a Thursday segment on America’s Newsroom, Heinrich shared just how difficult it was to report honestly on Biden’s health — not because of a lack of sources, but because of the White House’s aggressive tactics to silence skepticism.
“For about three years, they would go like this,” Heinrich said, crossing her arms to imitate the way other reporters distanced themselves. “They don’t want to be associated.”
She wasn’t talking about political hacks. She meant fellow journalists. The message was clear: ask real questions about Biden’s mental acuity, and you’d be branded a bad actor — even by your peers. Heinrich revealed that members of the press office, including senior deputies under Karine Jean-Pierre, would tell her to her face that she wasn’t a “good reporter” simply for pursuing leads that painted the president in an unflattering light.
“They abused us, too,” she said bluntly.
This lines up perfectly with what we now know: that Biden’s handlers went to extreme lengths to script public appearances, hide signs of cognitive decline, and project a façade of competence — even as the president forgot names, lost his train of thought, and wandered off during events.
It also reinforces the growing belief among critics that Biden’s presidency was largely propped up by a complicit press, too afraid or too loyal to do its job. And for those few who dared to challenge the narrative? They were smeared, sidelined, and shut down.
Heinrich, to her credit, kept pressing — questioning why Biden needed cheat sheets at pressers, or if his rhetoric against Trump was crossing the line into incitement. On more than one occasion, her questions sent KJP into visible fits of irritation, culminating in abrupt exits and stonewalling.
Now that Biden’s decline is an open secret, the same media that tried to destroy Trump over a misspelled tweet is suddenly rediscovering its spine. But for Heinrich and others who actually did the work — and took the hits — it’s not vindication. It’s a reminder of how corrupt, coordinated, and cowardly the gatekeepers of “truth” really were.
Maybe next time the press should do its job before the country elects someone unfit to serve. Just a thought.
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