You’ve likely seen the viral video from last week’s Hollywood fundraiser where Barack Obama appeared to step in to assist Joe Biden. The footage has garnered widespread attention and concern.
At the fundraiser, it seemed Biden was fortunate to have Obama by his side to help him regain his composure and guide him off the stage. However, the White House disputes this interpretation, asserting that nothing unusual occurred.
According to Biden’s senior deputy press secretary, Andrew Bates, Rupert Murdoch’s New York Post has been accused of repeatedly misleading its audience with deceptive content. Bates remarked that the Post’s recent portrayal of Biden’s brief pause to acknowledge the crowd as problematic is another instance of their skewed reporting. Bates suggested that their ethical practices need improvement.
Bates emphasized that the clip simply showed the President pausing to absorb the crowd’s applause and criticized those who suggest otherwise. He pointed out that detractors fail to address Biden’s achievements, such as driving significant economic growth, reducing violent crime to historic lows, restoring manufacturing jobs, and strengthening alliances.
Despite the White House’s statements, media outlets like The Daily Beast support the narrative that the video was manipulated to misrepresent Biden. They argue that the clip was edited to imply Biden was disoriented, a tactic previously used by right-wing media to criticize him.
The Daily Beast and other liberal media claim Biden was merely acknowledging the crowd’s cheers, dismissing the notion of him freezing up as laughable. They pointed out that the Republican National Committee initially shared the misleading clip, which was then propagated by various right-wing outlets.
Critics question how additional footage would change the perception of Biden’s brief pause on stage. They also highlight how mainstream media often aligns with the Biden campaign’s narrative without holding it accountable for its own instances of altering videos for political purposes.
Recently, the Biden campaign inaccurately accused Trump of calling Milwaukee a “horrible city,” despite Trump making no such statement.
