White House Cleans Up Again After Joe Biden Questions Legitimacy of 2022 Election

The White House spent Thursday morning trying to clean up comments President Joe Biden made questioning the legitimacy of the 2022 midterms.

“Lets be clear: The president was not casting doubt on the legitimacy of the 2022 election,” White House press secretary Jen Psaki wrote on social media.

Lets be clear: @potus was not casting doubt on the legitimacy of the 2022 election. He was making the opposite point: In 2020, a record number of voters turned out in the face of a pandemic, and election officials made sure they could vote and have those votes counted.

— Jen Psaki (@PressSec) January 20, 2022

During his press conference, Biden repeatedly warned that voting reforms passed by Republicans in states could call into question the results of the election.

“Oh, yeah, I think it easily could be — be illegitimate,” Biden said when asked about the 2022 midterms, as Breitbart News reported.

Biden repeatedly questioned the legitimacy of the upcoming 2022 election, unless bills were passed in Congress to federalize elections.

“I’m not going to say it’s going to be legit,” he said. “It’s — the increase and the prospect of being illegitimate is in direct proportion to us not being able to get these — these reforms passed.”

Psaki claimed Biden was actually trying to support the legitimacy of the election.

Biden questioned the legitimacy of the 2022 midterm elections, after repeatedly lecturing former President Donald Trump and Republicans for casting doubts on the 2020 presidential election. https://t.co/xf5te5BKmg

— Breitbart News (@BreitbartNews) January 20, 2022

“Let’s be clear: The president was not casting doubt on the legitimacy of the 2022 election,” she wrote. “He was making the opposite point.”

She claimed Biden was challenging Republicans for trying to overturn the 2020 election results on claims of election fraud.

“The Big Lie is putting our democracy at risk. We’re fighting to protect it,” she concluded.

Psaki also went on Fox News to try to explain Biden’s comments.

.@PressSec told Fox News that President Biden "absolutely is not predicting that the 2022 elections would be illegitimate."

In a Wednesday press conference, @POTUS said "it depends" when asked if the midterm elections will be free and fair if his voting rights agenda stalls. pic.twitter.com/enwD3xKSOQ

— Mediaite (@Mediaite) January 20, 2022

Psaki’s latest attempt to explain the president is not the only thing she had to correct after Biden’s nearly two-hour press conference on Wednesday.

She immediately released a statement on Russia and Ukraine after Biden shocked the world by suggesting Putin “has to do something” on Ukraine and that a “minor incursion” might be allowed.

“President Biden has been clear with the Russian President: If any Russian military forces move across the Ukrainian border, that’s a renewed invasion, and it will be met with a swift, severe, and united response from the United States and our Allies,” Psaki wrote, insisting that Biden “affirmed today that those acts of Russian aggression will be met with a decisive, reciprocal, and united response.”