WASHINGTON (AP) — House Republicans have called on the White House to produce all documents and internal communications related to President Joe Biden’s statement earlier this week in which he appeared to take a swipe at supporters of Donald Trump.
White House press officials changed the official transcript of Biden’s statement and drew objections from the federal employees who document such comments for posterity, according to two U.S. government officials and an internal email obtained Thursday by The Associated Press.
The lawmakers said they question whether the decision to “create a false transcript and produce the accurate transcript” for the National Archives and Records Administration violated federal law.
Representative James Comer, the Republican chairman of the House Committee on Oversight and Accountability, and House Republican Conference Chairman Elise Stefanik demanded that the White House produce the documents. They also call on the White House to make the top supervisor of the White House Stenography Office available for a briefing.
“The White House cannot simply rewrite President Biden’s rhetoric,” Comer and Stefanik wrote. “…We are concerned by the latest reporting regarding the White House’s apparent political decision to protect the Biden-Harris administration, rather than following long-standing and proper protocols.”
Biden caused a stir earlier this week with his comments to Latino activists responding to racist remarks at a Trump rally by comedian Tony Hinchcliffe, who called the US island territory of Puerto Rico a “floating island of garbage.”
Biden, according to a transcript prepared by official White House stenographers, told the Latino group during a video call on Tuesday evening: “The only trash I see floating out there is his supporters – his – his demonization of Latinos is unconscionable, and it’s unreasonable. -American.”
However, the transcript released by the White House press office presented the quote with an apostrophe, reading “supporters” instead of “supporters,” which aides said indicated Biden was criticizing Hinchcliffe, not the millions of Americans who support Trump as president.
