WASHINGTON, D.C.—“It’s 9 a.m., and President Biden is perfectly alive and breathing,” read yet another press release from the White House. Most people find it reassuring to know the president isn’t dead. Yet the hourly, completely unprompted assurances that Biden has not died are starting to have the opposite effect on people.
"I don’t usually spend a lot of time worrying that the president is dead,” said Washington D.C. citizen Tony Underwood, “but the constant statements from the White House have got me on edge.” Underwood pointed particularly to a recent one that said, “Biden is alive, but we can’t take a picture because he is sleeping and we don’t want to disturb him but it is a normal sleep and not a coma so he should wake normally.”
And now, at least half the content from Biden’s official Twitter account is on the topic of his being alive. “It is I, Joe Biden. I am alive,” read a recent tweet. “And it’s really me writing this and not my staff. Malarkey. Come on, man. Those are things I say.”
When asked why all the sudden assurances that Biden is alive, White House Press Secretary Jen Psaki said, “Everyone just loves having a president who is very much alive — such as Joe Biden. Why, I was just saying to Vice President Kamala Harris the other day, ‘You’re still the vice president because Biden is alive.’ And when she asked to see him, I said, ‘You can’t, because he’s sleeping.’” Psaki seemed to tear up a bit. “‘Sleeping for a very long time.’”
And when reporters inquired if they would soon be able to ask Biden questions, Psaki said no, but not because Biden is dead but because he’s “evasive.”
“Evasive,” Psaki repeated, “just like a normal, alive politician.”