In a Senate committee hearing examining former President Joe Biden’s mental acuity while in office, top Republicans accused the administration and its allies of concealing Biden’s cognitive decline for political gain. Senators John Cornyn (R-TX) and Ted Cruz (R-TX) led the charge, arguing that both Democratic officials and the media put power above constitutional duty.
Sean Spicer (R), White House Press Secretary under President Trump (R), criticized what he called selective alarmism from Biden’s allies.
“The left and their friends in the media like to throw around terms like ‘threats to democracy’ and ‘constitutional crisis,’” Spicer said. “If we don’t have confidence in the leader of the free world making decisions, that truly is the definition of a constitutional crisis and a threat to democracy.”
Spicer argued that both Democratic officials and members of the media failed to act when signs of Biden’s diminished capacity became evident.
“They were more concerned with power and preserving that power and an agenda than they were with really caring about the Constitution and democracy,” he added.
Senator John Cornyn (R-TX) echoed Spicer’s sentiments, pointing to what he called a politically motivated delay in addressing Biden’s fitness.
“Obviously they decided to do it only in such a time as that ability to wield power was coming to an end,” Sen. Cornyn said. “If in fact President Biden had remained the nominee of the Democratic Party then ran against and lost to Trump, these folks would be out of luck and out of power.”
Sen. Cornyn also used the hearing to critique Biden’s record on immigration, calling his border policies “one of the most consequential actions of the Biden presidency.” Holding up a stack of executive orders and proclamations, Cornyn cited the administration’s decisions to rescind Trump-era enforcement measures and expand parole and temporary protected status programs.
“They also include things like granting temporary protective status to large populations of immigrants, particularly from countries in Central America,” Cornyn said. “Granting parole, which is essentially a permission slip to enter the country in a way that would otherwise be illegal.”
In a prior hearing, Sen. Ted Cruz (R-TX) offered one of the most pointed rebukes of Biden’s presidency to date. “The Biden administration may go down in history as the most brazen constitutional fraud in history,” Sen. Cruz said. “A presidency fronted by a failing puppet with staffers behind the scenes pulling the strings. This is not a political hyperbole. The American people saw it with their own eyes.”
While Democrats have largely defended the former president’s performance, Republican lawmakers say the public deserved more transparency.
The committee is expected to hold additional hearings in the coming weeks as part of a broader inquiry into presidential fitness and executive accountability.
