Reports: White House altered official transcript of Joe Biden's 'garbage' remarks
Published 1 November 2024
WASHINGTON – White House press officials reportedly altered the official transcript of a call in which President Joe Biden appeared to disparage supporters of former President Donald Trump, according to published reports.
The change to the official transcript drew objections from the stenographers who are charged with documenting the president’s remarks for posterity, the Associated Press reported, citing two government officials and an internal email obtained by the news agency. Fox News said it also had confirmed the existence of the email.
The revelation comes as the White House is dealing with the uproar caused by Biden’s remarks, which sparked a backlash among outraged Republicans and created a political dilemma for Vice President Kamala Harris just days before the Nov. 5 election.
Biden made the remark during a Zoom call on Tuesday with Voto Latino, an organization encouraging Latino and Hispanic youth to become politically engaged. On the call, Biden denounced offensive jokes that podcast host Tony Hinchcliffe made about Puerto Rico during Trump’s Madison Square Garden rally over the weekend.
“Just the other day, a speaker at his rally called Puerto Rico a ‘floating island of garbage,’” Biden said. He added that the only “garbage” he saw “floating out there” were supporters, though it was unclear if he was referring just to Hinchcliffe or all of Trump’s fans.
The White House released a transcript of Biden’s remarks Tuesday night that added an apostrophe to Biden’s quote, which made it read “supporter’s” instead of “supporters.” White House aides insisted the president was referring to Hinchcliffe, not all Americans who support the former president.
The change to the transcript was made after the press office “conferred with the president,” according to an internal email from the head of the stenographers’ office that was obtained by the AP. The news organization said it confirmed the authenticity of the email by two government officials who spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss internal matters.
The supervisor, in the email, said the press office’s handling of the matter amounted to “a breach of protocol and spoliation of transcript integrity between the Stenography and Press Offices,” the AP said.
“If there is a difference in interpretation, the Press Office may choose to withhold the transcript but cannot edit it independently,” the supervisor wrote, adding, “Our Stenography Office transcript — released to our distro, which includes the National Archives – is now different than the version edited and released to the public by Press Office staff.”