Original Sin: President Biden’s Decline, Its Cover-Up, and his Disastrous Choice to Run Again

Jake Tapper, & Alex Thompson, Original Sin: President Biden’s Decline, Its Cover-Up, and his Disastrous Choice to Run Again, (New York: Penguin Press, 2025), ISBN 9798217060672, $32.00 

 I was given a copy of Original Sin and read it wondering what it could tell me of the Biden saga that I did not already know? We know Joe Biden was 82 for the 2024 presidential election and would be 86 at the end of a second term. How much more information did I need since I could see he had aged just looking at him on television and then he accepted a debate with Trump, which ended any doubt about another term given the blank pauses and fumbling speech. In the Author’s Note they tell readers “Our only agenda is to present the disturbing reality of what happened in the White House and the Democratic presidential campaign in 2023-2024, as told to us by approximately two hundred people, including lawmakers and White House and campaign insiders, . . .” 

 The book has 19 chapters and runs 314 pages and I can testify the authors did an impressive job organizing the material from all those interviews and writing a clearly worded narrative. The primary story they tell shows Joe Biden, his wife Jill and his loyal White House advisors unable to face the very real doubts of a second term; there was denial and a loss of objectivity but nothing Joe Biden did could be called a cover up, a term that connotes legal misconduct. Since presidents have to be visible, their family and advisors have no duty to offer any doubts they might have to the public; the public must expect to make up their own mind. 

The authors interviewed Democratic and Republican office holders, party officials, pollsters and other journalists, both necessary and appropriate, but they added related personal and family history to the primary story. I tried to connect the discussion of the Biden family troubles of sons Beau, and Hunter and daughter Ashley, but that discussion always felt tacked onto their stated purpose: “Our only agenda is to present what happened in the White House and the Democratic presidential campaign.” 

 I found it difficult to construe the loss of son Beau to cancer and Hunter’s legal missteps as part of President Biden’s Decline, or his decision to press on for a second term. The discussion of these matters feels especially callus and unnecessary given just the facts the authors provide. They explain “The Plea Deal.” Hunter would plead guilty to evading $200,000 in income taxes and illegal possession of a fire arm. Biden opponents howled their objections and the federal judge in the case, Maryellen Noreika, a Trump appointee, refused to accept the plea deal, dragging out the case further. 

As I recall President Biden promised to allow his appointed Attorney General, Merrick Garland, to go ahead and prosecute Hunters case as part of his general promise to avoid interfering with federal law enforcement, but that was before losing the 2024 election and listening to Trump make repeated threats to him and his family with claims the Biden’s were part of an “organized crime family.” Recognizing the harassment Trump would create for his family he used his pardon power to protect them at the last moments of his term. In doing so, he was defensive and suggested toxic politics had something to do with the outcome of the case and his need to give blanket pardons. For this decision, the author’s make sweeping condemnation; they quote the prosecutor characterizing the pardons as “gratuitous and wrong” and that Merrick Garland was “tremendously disappointed” and that “To many Democrats, this was another ignominious act by a president who repeatedly put the interests of his family ahead of those of this party and country.” These conclusions feel sanctimonious and hypocritical given Trump’s pardons of hundreds of the January 6 felons. To some of us Hunter Biden’s crimes feel trivial compared to assaulting the U.S. Capital and refusing to accept the 2020 election results. 

I struggle to find a purpose for writing the story of Joe Biden’s Decline. A four page conclusion chapter asks “What if a president is unable to discharge their duties but doesn’t recognize that fact?” The authors admit those close to President Biden were always ready “to attest to his ability to make sound decisions if on his own schedule.” There is a suggestion Congress could legally require the president’s physician to certify to Congress the president is fit to serve, but so far in U.S. history only death assures a president will be unfit for office; there is no mention that anyone in Congress has offered such legislation. The authors mention several other questionable presidents, but offer no solution to future presidents and evaluating their qualification for office. 

 If there was a lessen for the future in the Joe Biden case I could not find it in Original Sin. I make note that both authors have worked in corporate media and wonder if they could keep their jobs writing a similar book about Donald Trump? .