Close Biden Aides Feared He’d Need Wheelchair If Re-Elected, Clashed With His Doctor: New Book
As former President Joe Biden insisted he was running a 2024 campaign against Donald Trump, his closest aides were privately planning on his likely need for a wheelchair if re-elected – determining that they’d need to conceal the conversation until after voters cast their ballots.
According to Original Sin, the forthcoming book by CNN anchor Jake Tapper and Axios correspondent Alex Thompson, the team engaged in a behind-the-scenes scramble to manage Biden’s mobility included stage modifications, handrails, sneakers, and shorter walking routes – all carefully choreographed to avoid public stumbles after the president tripped over a sandbag in 2023.
Axios reports that the Biden team believed it was “politically untenable” for Biden to opt for wheelchair use.
“Biden’s physical deterioration — most apparent in his halting walk — had become so severe that there were internal discussions about putting the president in a wheelchair, but they couldn’t do so until after the election,” the authors write, according to an exclusive preview published in Axios on Tuesday.
White House physician Dr. Kevin O’Connor reportedly clashed with Biden’s political team, pushing for more downtime and warning that another fall could make a wheelchair necessary. He even reportedly joked that aides were trying to kill him, while he tried to keep him alive.
Throughout 2024, Biden staffers blamed his gait on a 2020 foot fracture, but the book notes that O’Connor himself had publicly declared that injury fully healed. The real culprit, according to O’Connor’s reports, was “significant spinal arthritis.”
Biden eventually dropped out after a disastrous debate against Trump, endorsing Vice President Kamala Harris instead.
A Biden spokesperson dismissed the claims as overblown and that the former president had been “transparent” about his ailments, adding that there were “physical changes” but “no special treatment was necessary” and Biden remained “a very effective president.”
