CNN White House Correspondent Kaitlan Collins pushed back on Republican Senator Bernie Moreno’s assertion that she had not covered the Biden autopen scandal as in-depth as the Epstein Files scandal.
In a heated debate over the administration’s handling of the Epstein files debacle on Thursday’s episode of The Source with Kaitlan Collins, Moreno danced around criticisms related to the scandal.
“You know what we’re not talking about, the autopen scandal,” Moreno said to Collins. “Did you guys spend 30 minutes talking about the autopen scandal? Did you spend 30 minutes talking about the fact that Democrats hid the knowledge that President Biden was compromised?”
Collins interjected to remind Moreno that her colleague, Jake Tapper, wrote a book dedicated to investigating the White House’s handling of former president Joe Biden’s alleged declining health.
“Jake Tapper wrote an entire book on it, and we covered it at length. I think you can do both things, you can walk and chew gum at the same time, senator, with all due respect,” Collins said.
The autopen scandal refers to the belief among Republicans and the president that Biden staffers used the autopen to have the former president sign official documents without Biden’s knowledge. It’s part of their larger theory that the White House concealed evidence that Biden’s cognitive and physical health was in decline.
Biden has denied those allegations.
Moreno’s attempt to redirect the conversation from the Epstein scandal to the autopen scandal appeared unsuccessful. Collins continued to press Moreno to provide some commentary about Trump pulling the rug from underneath his supporters, who hoped his administration would release documents related to the government’s investigation into Epstein.
“I understand you’re argument that you’re trying to blame it on the media and Democrats, but the whole point of this scandal, which, when the president said last week, ‘I can’t believe people are still talking about Jeffrey Epstein,’ it’s his supporters who are talking,” Collins reminded Moreno.
Despite Trump, his Attorney General Pam Bondi, FBI Director Kash Patel, and Deputy FBI Director Dan Bongino claiming they would release the Epstein Files, the administration put an abrupt stop to speculation last week when it released a memo stating there were no extraordinary findings.
The news disappointed people who had believed conspiracy theories that the secrecy around the Epstein investigation was to prevent the public from finding out other high-profile individuals were involved in Epstein’s decades-long sex abuse and child sex trafficking scheme.
Even some Republican lawmakers who have bolstered theories about the Epstein Files have pushed for Trump to release documents in the investigation.
On Thursday, the Wall Street Journal published a report accusing Trump of sending Epstein a birthday letter in the early 2000s that included lewd references to sexual relations with women. The president has denied the report.
Moreno defended the president on Thursday night, calling the report “a fake story.”
Despite Collins’ best efforts to get Moreno to provide commentary about the scandal, he continued to highlight the administration’s successes and downplayed the potential impact on Trump voters who were promised the release of the Epstein Files.
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