Latest news with #JosephBiden
New York Times
2 days ago
- Politics
- New York Times
Excerpts From The Times's Interview With Biden on Clemency Decisions
Former President Joseph R. Biden Jr. spoke to The New York Times by phone on Thursday about clemency actions he granted toward the end of his term. Mr. Biden did not personally sign the official warrants recording those decisions; rather his White House staff used an autopen device to do so. President Trump and his allies have since called into question Mr. Biden's mental acuity and seized on the use of the autopen. Mr. Trump has denounced the pardons and commutations as illegitimate and claimed that Mr. Biden's staff conspired to run the presidency in his name using the device. Both the Justice Department and congressional Republicans have opened investigations. Mr. Biden granted large batch commutations to reduce the sentences of three categories of federal convicts: shielding about 1,500 people who had been serving home confinement since the pandemic from being forced back to prison; reducing the sentences of about 2,500 nonviolent drug offenders to what they would have received under current policies; and turning the sentences of 37 of the 40 inmates on death row into life without parole. He also granted pardons to several people whose cases have received political attention, including pre-emptive pardons to people who had drawn the ire of Mr. Trump. Among them were members and staff of the House committee that investigated the Jan. 6 Capitol attack along with Capitol Police officers who testified before the panel, Dr. Anthony S. Fauci, the retired Gen. Mark A. Milley, the former chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, and members of Mr. Biden's family. Below are excerpts. I made every single one of those. And — including the categories, when we set this up to begin with. And so — but I understand why Trump would think that, because obviously, I guess, he doesn't focus much. Anyway, so — yes, I made every decision. Because there were a lot of them. Want all of The Times? Subscribe.
New York Times
7 days ago
- Health
- New York Times
Ex-White House Doctor Refuses Questions in G.O.P. Inquiry on Biden's Mental Acuity
Former President Joseph R. Biden Jr.'s White House physician refused on Wednesday to answer questions for a Republican-led congressional investigation into Mr. Biden's mental acuity. The doctor, Kevin O'Connor, cited both physician-patient privilege and his Fifth Amendment right against self-incrimination, according to a statement that one of his lawyers read to the House Oversight Committee at the start of his scheduled closed-door deposition. Dr. O'Connor, who served all four years as Mr. Biden's doctor in the White House, had been subpoenaed by Republicans on the oversight panel who are investigating whether Mr. Biden and his aides concealed mental deficiencies that made him unable to perform presidential duties. The inquiry includes questions about whether Mr. Biden's staff abused an autopen, a device routinely used by presidents to put their signatures to formal documents, to illegally carry out official actions in his name. Presidents have for decades used an autopen to sign all manner of documents, including major legislation; doing so is legal as long as a president authorizes it. President Trump and his allies have been stoking a theory that Mr. Biden suffered from severe age-related decline that left him incapable of making presidential decisions at all, making any action taken in his name via the device legally invalid. In a statement, Representative James Comer, Republican of Kentucky and the Oversight chairman, blasted Dr. O'Connor for refusing to cooperate and suggested he was trying to hide something. 'It's clear there was a conspiracy to cover up President Biden's cognitive decline after Dr. Kevin O'Connor, Biden's physician and family business associate, refused to answer any questions and chose to hide behind the Fifth Amendment,' he said. 'The American people demand transparency, but Dr. O'Connor would rather conceal the truth.' Want all of The Times? Subscribe.
New York Times
08-07-2025
- Politics
- New York Times
How Insularity Defined the Last Stages of Biden's Career
Former President Joseph R. Biden Jr.'s aides did not want him to speak with me. For months, as I worked on a book about the 2024 presidential election, I made multiple requests for an interview with Mr. Biden. One of my co-authors had sat down with President-elect Donald J. Trump, and we felt it was critical to talk to Mr. Biden. But the former president's aides said he was working on a memoir, and that would conflict with my book. Yet when I reached Mr. Biden on his cellphone in late March, he answered and agreed to talk. He broke his silence on his successor to criticize the early weeks of Mr. Trump's second term. 'I don't see anything he's done that's been productive,' the former president said. When I asked if he had any regrets about dropping out of the presidential race, Mr. Biden said, in a detached tone, 'No, not now. I don't spend a lot of time on regrets.' Then he hung up because he was boarding an Amtrak train. My brief conversation with Mr. Biden prompted a cascade of concern among his top aides. One screamed at me for calling the former president directly. Others texted furiously, trying to figure out how I had obtained Mr. Biden's phone number. Mr. Biden had seemed open to continuing the conversation, but my subsequent calls went straight to voice mail. His automated greeting simply said, 'Joe.' Two days later, that greeting was replaced by a message from Verizon Wireless: 'The number you dialed has been changed, disconnected or is no longer in service.' Want all of The Times? Subscribe.
New York Times
02-07-2025
- Politics
- New York Times
Trump Asks Justices to Let Him Fire Consumer Product Safety Regulators
President Trump asked the Supreme Court on Wednesday to let him fire the three Democratic members of the five-member Consumer Product Safety Commission, which monitors the safety of items like toys, cribs and electronics. A federal law shields the officials, allowing them to be terminated only for 'neglect of duty or malfeasance.' Mr. Trump gave no reasons for removing them when his administration revealed his intentions in May, and has said that congressional limits on his ability to fire leaders of independent agencies are an unconstitutional check on his power to control the executive branch. In an interim order in May concerning the leaders of two other agencies, the Supreme Court appeared to agree. The majority wrote that Mr. Trump could remove officials who exercise power on his behalf 'because the Constitution vests the executive power in the president.' The earlier cases concerned Cathy A. Harris, a member of the Merit Systems Protection Board, and Gwynne A. Wilcox, a member of the National Labor Relations Board. Those cases are pending in the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit. The lower-court judge who ruled that the consumer agency's leaders could not be fired, Judge Matthew J. Maddox of the Federal District Court in Maryland, cited a 1935 Supreme Court ruling in his decision in June. Judge Maddox, who was appointed by President Joseph R. Biden Jr., said the 1935 precedent, Humphrey's Executor v. United States, barred the firings. The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit, in Richmond, Va., rejected the administration's request for a pause of Judge Maddox's ruling in an unsigned ruling on Tuesday. In a concurring opinion, Judge James A. Wynn Jr., who was appointed by President Barack Obama, wrote that Humphrey's Executor had not been overruled and governed the case. In the administration's emergency application, D. John Sauer, the solicitor general, said the court's emergency order in May 'squarely controls this case.' 'If anything,' he wrote, 'this is an even stronger case for a stay. President Trump decided to remove three commissioners who would otherwise make up a majority of the C.P.S.C., and whose actions since their putative reinstatement only underscore their hostility to the president's agenda.'
New York Times
20-06-2025
- Politics
- New York Times
Repeal of Clean Energy Law Will Mean a Hotter Planet, Scientists Warn
When President Joseph R. Biden Jr. signed the 2022 Inflation Reduction Act, he called it 'the most aggressive action ever, ever, ever to confront the climate crisis.' Now, Republicans are poised to undo the law, and scientists are warning the result would increase the likelihood that the Earth will heat up by an average of 3 degrees Celsius above preindustrial levels by the end of this century. 'We're already in an era now where climate change is going to be increasingly dangerous,' said Jonathan T. Overpeck, a climate scientist and the dean of the University of Michigan's School for Environment and Sustainability. That amount of warming — 3 degrees Celsius (5.4 degrees Fahrenheit) over the course of a century — may sound small. But 2024, the hottest year on record, was the first calendar year where the global average temperature exceeded 1.5 degrees Celsius above preindustrial levels, and it delivered deadly heat, violent hurricanes, severe drought and devastating wildfires. The Biden administration's strategy to fight climate change consisted of tax breaks to nudge the country toward clean energy and away from fossil fuels, the burning of which is heating the planet, paired with strict limits on pollution from smokestacks and tailpipes. That would have put the United States on track to cut emissions about 40 percent below 2005 levels by 2035, closer to the goal that scientists say all industrialized nations must meet in order to keep global warming within relatively safe limits. The United States is currently the second biggest emitter of greenhouse gases, behind China. But it is the country that has pumped the most carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases into the atmosphere since the Industrial Revolution. Want all of The Times? Subscribe.
