With just over a month left in office, top members of President Biden’s Cabinet are standing behind their past statements expressing support for his leadership and their belief that he is still fit for office — despite a year of controversy and debate over Biden’s ability to serve out his term.
Fox News Digital reached out to Cabinet officials and their departments, asking them if they believed President Biden was fit to serve, and if they stood by past statements of confidence in his ability to continue.
DHS Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas, in a statement in September, said that he has ‘full confidence in President Biden’s ability to carry out his job.
‘As I’ve said before, I come fully prepared for my meetings with President Biden, knowing his questions will be detail-oriented, probing, and exacting. In our exchanges, the President always draws upon our prior conversations and past events in analyzing the issues and reaching his conclusions,’ he said.
On Monday, DHS said that the secretary stands by those comments.
Secretary of Commerce Gina Raimondo has called Biden ‘one of the most accomplished presidents in American history and continues to effectively lead our country with a steady hand.’
‘As someone who is actually in the room when the President meets with the cabinet and foreign leaders, I can tell you he is an incisive and extraordinary leader,’ Raimondo said.
A spokesperson said this week that Raimondo stands by those comments.
Sabrina Singh, deputy Pentagon press secretary told Fox in September: ‘As Secretary Austin has said before, he has watched President Biden make tough national security decisions and seen his commitment to keeping our troops safe – he has nothing but total confidence in our Commander-in-Chief.’
This week, Singh said those comments still stand.
Biden’s mental acuity was a subject of speculation even preceding him being sworn into office, but discussion about its implications came to a head this year after what was widely seen as a disastrous debate performance against former President Donald Trump that seemingly initiated the process to replace him on the Democratic ticket in the race for the presidency.
Biden eventually dropped out of the race, handing the nomination to Vice President Kamala Harris, who would in turn go on to lose in the November election against President-elect Trump. But while Biden said he would not seek re-election, he chose not to step down from office.
The subject of Biden’s acuity re-emerged in September when he handed over the reins of a Cabinet meeting to first lady Jill Biden. But it was then that Cabinet members backed Biden and said they had no concerns about his ability to serve.
Secretary of Health and Human Services Xavier Becerra — one of Biden’s staunch defenders — said Biden ‘has done more as president for this country than any other president whom I have worked with since 1992.’
‘So yes, not only can he do the job, but he has been doing it,’ he said in a statement to Fox News Digital. ‘And we are fortunate to have someone who continues to use all of his experience to take us further. If you recall where we were four years ago, the depth of a pandemic, Americans losing their jobs, Americans losing their health care. Today, more Americans are employed than ever before. Today, more Americans have health coverage than ever before. No President in the history of this country has ever placed 700 million vaccines in the arms of Americans to keep them alive and keep them healthy. The result? Our economy is healthy.’
‘Is he fit? He’s proving it,’ Becerra added.
An HHS spokesperson said that Becerra’s comments stand.
Spokespersons for other agencies that had previously commented, including the Environmental Protection Agency, the Department of Energy and the Department of Agriculture, also said they stood by those comments.
As it stands, President Biden will finish his term on Jan. 20 when President-elect Trump is sworn into office.
Biden spoke this week at a DNC holiday celebration in Washington, D.C. During his remarks he argued that the country is in a ‘resoundingly’ better position today than when he and Harris entered the White House.
‘The one thing I’ve always believed about public service, and especially about the presidency, is the importance of asking yourself, have we left the country in better shape than we found it? Today, I can say with every fiber of my being, of all my heart, the answer to that question is a resounding yes,’ he said.
He went on to encourage staffers to ‘stay engaged’ in the years ahead.
‘You’re not going anywhere, kid,’ Biden said of Harris. ‘Because we’re not gonna let you.’