In 2024, a growing distrust in traditional media reached a boiling point, driven by what many Americans saw as a deliberate attempt to obscure President Joe Biden’s cognitive decline. The public’s faith in legacy outlets—already strained by years of perceived bias—took a significant hit as newsrooms downplayed or dismissed viral videos showing Biden struggling in public settings. Instead of engaging with these moments transparently, major media organizations often labeled them as misleading, framing them as part of a right-wing smear campaign. This approach not only failed to address legitimate concerns about Biden’s age and mental acuity but also deepened skepticism among voters who felt gaslit by the very institutions meant to inform them.

The term “cheap fakes” became a cornerstone of this media strategy, used to deflect scrutiny from Biden’s public appearances. By categorizing unflattering clips as manipulated or out-of-context, outlets like The Washington Post, CNN, and NBC News sought to shield the then-presumptive Democratic nominee from questions about his fitness for office. However, as these videos proliferated—showing Biden freezing at events, wandering off during summits, or needing assistance to navigate stages—the public began to question the media’s credibility.

When Biden’s cognitive struggles were laid bare during a disastrous debate performance, the gap between the media’s narrative and reality became impossible to ignore. For many, this was proof that their instincts were correct all along, further eroding trust in a press that seemed more interested in protecting a candidate than reporting the truth.

This pattern of dismissal wasn’t just a 2024 phenomenon; it reflected a deeper issue with how legacy media handled inconvenient truths. By prioritizing narrative over evidence, these outlets alienated audiences who could see the videos for themselves on social media platforms like X. The insistence that voters were being misled by “cheap fakes” felt patronizing, as if the public couldn’t be trusted to interpret what they saw with their own eyes. This disconnect has had lasting consequences, leaving many Americans to seek information elsewhere and fueling a growing belief that the media serves as an arm of political campaigns rather than a check on power.

A new book, Original Sin: President Biden’s Decline, Its Cover-Up, and His Disastrous Choice to Run Again, has reignited focus on how legacy media worked to shield Biden from scrutiny over his age and cognitive health. The book, co-authored by CNN anchor Jake Tapper, details the White House’s efforts to downplay Biden’s struggles, particularly through the “cheap fakes” narrative that dominated headlines in 2024. Viral moments that raised eyebrows—such as Biden appearing frozen at a Juneteenth celebration, wandering off at the G-7 Summit, or being guided offstage by former President Barack Obama at an L.A. fundraiser—were consistently dismissed by media allies as misleading or manipulated.

In the weeks before Biden’s debate performance exposed his decline on a global stage, these videos gained traction online. At the White House Juneteenth event, Biden stood motionless while others danced around him. At the G-7 Summit, he appeared to drift away from world leaders, only to be gently redirected by Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni. And at the L.A. fundraiser, footage showed Obama escorting a seemingly disoriented Biden offstage. These clips, widely shared on platforms like X, sparked concern among viewers, but the Biden administration and its media allies pushed back hard, labeling them “cheap fakes.”

“I think you have all called this the ‘cheap fakes’ video. And that’s exactly what they are,” White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre told reporters at a June 2024 briefing. “They’re done in bad faith.” Jean-Pierre’s comments echoed a term popularized by The Washington Post, which had used “cheap fakes” as early as July 2022 to dismiss a viral clip of Biden in Israel as misleading. The Post defined “cheap fakes” as “the practice of misrepresenting events that take place in a video by adding or leaving out context.”

By June 2024, The Post doubled down, publishing a detailed report to counter Republican-shared clips of Biden during his Normandy trip, including a moment where he paused awkwardly while bending to sit. “Such deceptively edited videos, known as ‘cheap fakes,’ have become staples of Republican attacks against the president,” the outlet claimed.

NBC News similarly accused Republicans of pushing a “false” narrative about Biden wandering aimlessly at the G-7 Summit, noting that “experts have warned that while advanced technology like generative artificial intelligence can spread misinformation, so-called cheap fakes that often use only minor or selective editing can be more effective at spreading false narratives.”

Other outlets followed suit. The New York Times ran a piece titled “How Misleading Videos Are Trailing Biden as He Battles Age Doubts,” arguing the clips were “edited or lack[ed] context.” CBS News warned about the electoral impact of “cheap fakes,” calling them a simpler version of “deepfakes.” CNN’s Brian Stelter explained, “We’ve been worried for years about AI deepfakes that computer-generated images are going to trick people into believing something that’s totally false. Cheap fakes are a little bit simpler. They’re cheap. They’re just distorted, out-of-context videos chopped up in certain ways, constructed in certain ways. That’s what we’re seeing.”

CNN host Abby Phillip took a more measured tone, acknowledging the age of both presidential candidates but cautioning viewers about “the Joe Biden that Republicans want you to see and the pipeline of videos that aren’t telling the full truth.” MSNBC’s Nicolle Wallace called out the “highly misleading and selectively edited videos” as “insidious,” while the Associated Press fact-checked claims about Biden freezing at the L.A. fundraiser, insisting he merely “paused amid cheers and applause” as he exited the stage with Obama.

Among Biden’s staunchest defenders was CNN’s Oliver Darcy, who argued, “These outlets are wrapping these videos in very misleading context, right? Saying that this is evidence that Biden was freezing. He’s not able to walk offstage on his own, and that’s obviously not the case, but that’s how it’s been portrayed in right-wing media.” Darcy framed the clips as part of a “years-long narrative” to portray Biden as “a senile old man incapable of governing the country.”

Yet, as Jake Tapper now admits in Original Sin, the “cheap fakes” label was often misapplied. Discussing the L.A. fundraiser clip, Tapper said on CNN, “The Biden White House falsely—when people showed that clip and asked what was going on—said it was a ‘cheap fake.’ They did this all the time when there was video that seemed to show Biden acting in an odd or unusual, seemingly out-of-it way, they would call it a ‘cheap fake.’ It was not fake. It was actual video.” This admission highlights a critical misstep by both the White House and its media allies, whose efforts to dismiss legitimate concerns as misinformation only deepened public skepticism in the lead-up to the 2024 election.

What is your opinion of the media after their coverup of Biden’s cognitive decline? Let us know what you think in the comments below!