WASHINGTON — The White House went on the offensive against The Post Monday for calling out President Biden’s frailty in a series of recent videos — only to make false statements of their own in the process.
Press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre accused The Post of spreading “misinformation” about videos of the 81-year-old president at recent events with G7 world leaders and former President Barack Obama.
Those events included a Thursday video of Biden being corralled by Italian PM Georgia Meloni after a skydiving demonstration and former President Barack Obama escorting his former VP off the stage at a glitzy Hollywood fundraiser Saturday night.
Jean-Pierre called the clips “cheap fakes”, meaning to claim they were altered by humans through techniques such as zooming in and leaving out context — but also incorrectly called them “deepfakes,” referring to AI-created footage with altered subjects and audio.
“I think you all have called this the ‘cheap fakes’ video and that’s exactly what they are, they are cheap fakes video [sic], and they are done in bad faith,” the press secretary said at her regular briefing.
“And some of your news organization [sic] have been very clear, have stressed that these right-wing — the right-wing critics of the president have a credibility problem because of, the fact-checkers have repeatedly caught them pushing misinformation, disinformation.”
Jean-Pierre then applauded the conservative Washington Examiner for ostensibly supporting her claims, although the publication merely quoted British Prime Minister Rishi Sunak trying to explain Biden’s actions.
The article cited by the press secretary included quotes from the UK leader acknowledging the president had not gone where he was supposed to go when he had to be pulled back to the group of his fellow leaders by Meloni.
“He just went over to kind of talk to all of them individually and Georgia was saying, ‘Don’t worry, they’re all coming to [us],’” the PM told reporters Friday.
“We were meant to line up so they could come and then shake all our hands.”
“To their credit, we have the conservative Washington Examiner, did call them out as well, calling out the New York Post,” Jean-Pierre said Monday.
“It tells you everything that we need to know about how desperate Republicans are here.
“And instead of talking about the president’s performance in office — and what I mean by that, his legislative wins, what he’s been able to do for the American people across the country — we’re seeing these deepfakes, these manipulated videos, and it is, again, done in bad faith.”
Following the briefing, Jean-Pierre admitted to The Post that she didn’t mean to use the term “deepfakes.”
“They are fakes – cheap fakes,” she said in reference to her incorrect use of the term.
Deputy press secretary Andrew Bates, who led the White House’s charge against The Post’s coverage of the videos, tweeted praise of Jean-Pierre, writing on X that she “hit a nerve when she quoted the *nonpartisan* reporters who called out the right’s desperate smear videos for what they are: ‘cheapfakes. [sic].’”
The White House had argued last week that fuller context showed that Biden was attempting to give encouragement to the skydivers in Italy and contested the notion that he had wandered off in an unusual manner — despite the unprecedented action by Meloni to return him to his fellow heads of government.
As for the video from the fundraiser, the president’s defenders have argued he was simply greeting the crowd.
