White House's Orwellian attempt to alter record of Biden's 'garbage' smear might be criminal, say lawmakers

President Joe Biden upheld the long-standing Democratic tradition of belittling Republican voters this week, claiming in a videotaped call Tuesday with Voto Latino that Trump supporters are "garbage."

Keenly aware of how damaging Biden's remarks were to Democrats in general but especially to Kamala Harris, who has recently been juggling Nazi accusations and promises of unity, elements of the liberal media attempted to fudge the record. They were not alone, however.

The White House also tried to gaslight Americans into thinking the president said something else entirely. It turns out that doing so not only resulted in a discrepancy between public and official records but was likely illegal.

Citing two U.S. government officials on an internal email, the Associated Press revealed Thursday evening that the White House press office ultimately released a transcript different from that prepared by official White House stenographers.

According to an internal email from the head of the stenography office, the change was made after the White House press office "conferred with the president."

'The Press Office may choose to withhold the transcript but cannot edit it independently.'

In the email, the supervisor claimed that the press office's revisionism constituted "a breach of protocol and spoliation of transcript integrity between the Stenography and Press Offices."

Here is what the White House transcript claimed that Biden said when complaining about comedian Tony Hinchliffe's Puerto Rico joke at President Donald Trump's Oct. 27 rally at Madison Square Garden:

In my home state of Delaware, they're good, decent, honorable people. The only garbage I see floating out there is his supporter's — his — his demonization of Latinos is unconscionable, and it's un-American.

This is the version posted on the White House website and repeatedly shared online by White House senior deputy press secretary Andrew Bates.

The addition of an apostrophe to "supporters" radically changes the meaning such that in a world where there was no video of Biden's remarks, Democrats could argue, perhaps with greater success than they have this week, that the president was just suggesting Hinchcliffe's supposed demonization of Latinos was unconscionable garbage.

There is, however, video evidence of remarks, where Biden clearly says:

The Puerto Rican that that I know — or Puerto Rico where I'm fr — in my home state of Delaware, they're good, decent, honorable people. The only garbage I see floating out there is his supporters. His, his, his demonization of Latinos is unconscionable, and it's un-American.

The Associated Press confirmed that "supporters" in the original transcript prepared by the White House stenographers contained no apostrophe.

"If there is a difference in interpretation, the Press Office may choose to withhold the transcript but cannot edit it independently," the supervisor noted in the internal letter. "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."

'The move is not only craven, but it also appears to be in violation of federal law.'

The stenography office supervisor reportedly wrote to White House communications director Ben LaBolt, press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre, and other Biden officials, "Regardless of urgency, it is essential to our transcripts' authenticity and legitimacy that we adhere to consistent protocol for requesting edits, approval, and release."

The supervisor apparently declined to comment, whereas Bates doubled down, suggesting, "The President confirmed in his tweet on Tuesday evening that he was addressing the hateful rhetoric from the comedian at Trump's Madison Square Garden rally. That was reflected in the transcript."

On Wednesday, House Republican Conference Chairwoman Elise Stefanik (R-N.Y.) and House Committee on Oversight and Accountability Chairman James Comer (R-Ky.) penned a letter to White House counsel Edward Siskel, demanding that the Biden White House retain and preserve all documents and internal communications pertaining to the release of the doctored transcript.

Stefanik and Comer suggested that by releasing a false transcript, the Biden White House may have violated the Presidential Records Act.

"Americans were rightfully insulted when President Biden, seeking to boost Ms. Harris's presidential campaign, referred to an enormous swath of the country as 'floating ... garbage,'" the Republicans noted in their letter. "President Biden's vindictive words were unsurprising, given his previous statements regarding people who choose not to vote for his preferred candidate. Unsurprising too were the White House's actions after he said them."

"Instead of apologizing or clarifying President Biden's words, the White House instead sought to change them (despite them being recorded on video) by releasing a false transcript of his remarks. The move is not only craven, but it also appears to be in violation of federal law, including the Presidential Records Act of 1978," added the letter.

The lawmakers also demanded that the White House issue "a corrected transcript with the accurate words."

Biden and his allies should by now be accustomed to correcting the record.

The Biden-Harris FBI recently had to change its crime statistics for 2022. Whereas the bureau originally claimed that violent crime fell by 2.1% that year, it actually spiked by at least 4.5%.

Blaze News reported in August that the Biden-Harris Bureau of Labor Statistics came clean about overstating job gains by 818,000 and was forced to revise down the total in its preliminary annual benchmark review.

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