Tapper claims Biden decline cover-up ‘maybe even worse than Watergate’

CNN host Jake Tapper said during an interview with Piers Morgan on Monday that the cover-up of former President Biden’s decline was “worse” than the Watergate scandal during Richard Nixon’s presidency. 

“‘Joe Biden is not Richard Nixon, and the hiding and cover-up of his deterioration is not Watergate.’ I am not entirely sure I agree, Jake with that conclusion,” Morgan said, quoting the book, during his show, “Piers Morgan Uncensored.”

Tapper and Axios reporter Alex Thompson released a book, “Original Sin: President Biden’s Decline, Its Cover-Up, and His Disastrous Choice to Run Again,” which details the cover-up of Biden’s decline and his choice to run for re-election.

“The next line is, ‘It is an entirely separate scandal’. It is a scandal. It is without question, and maybe even worse than Watergate in some ways. Because Richard Nixon was in control of his faculties when he wasn’t drinking, so the idea that, we don’t mean to exonerate,” Tapper said.

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“The only reason that we have the Watergate thing in there is because we quote Archibald Cox, who was a Watergate investigator, talking about how powerful the presidency is and how presidents get surrounded by people who have a vested interest in keeping that president propped up,” the CNN host added. “So that’s the only reason we invoke Watergate is just to make clear like, it’s not Watergate this is an entirely separate scandal, maybe even worse.” 

The Watergate scandal is known as the Nixon administration’s cover-up of a break-in at the Democratic National Committee headquarters during the 1972 election. The scandal was investigated and ultimately led to Nixon resigning in 1974.

Morgan agreed that the cover-up of Biden’s decline was worse than the Watergate scandal, before pressing Tapper on his coverage of the former president.

Morgan asked Tapper if he felt he owed the American people an apology “for slightly dropping the ball with this.” Morgan also played a clip of Tapper’s 2020 interview with Lara Trump, who worked for President Donald Trump’s campaign at the time, spotlighting some of his past coverage of the former president’s decline.

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“I feel like I owe the American people an acknowledgment that I wish I had covered the story better,” Tapper responded. “Knowing what we know now, and looking back on that interview, which I feel tremendous humility about, she [Lara Trump] was right and I was wrong. I did not see, in the moments he was having, I did not see that as cognitive decline.”

Tapper said he would try to do better with regard to his coverage during the discussion.

The CNN host acknowledged feeling “humility” when confronted about his past coverage, but has still been criticized for the book about Biden. 

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MSNBC host Mika Brzezinski insisted during an interview with Tapper and Thompson earlier this month that they covered the discussion about Biden’s age in real-time, taking issue with the authors’ allegation of a cover-up.

“Nobody agrees with me, but we debated this, and we covered this, and my point is that we did this in real time. There is definitely new information in this book, great reporting, but I want to understand why you’re using words like cover up, which insinuates a crime or something. Was there a crime committed? Because we’re in an environment where we are covering an administration that is actually in office right now, that is pushing the limits of the law in every way,” Brzezinski said.

Liberal co-host of “The View” Joy Behar complained during their show that Tapper was “hawking” the book on CNN, demanding to know when the CNN host would write a book about Trump’s decline.