Anthony Bernal, dubbed Jill Biden’s “work husband,” became the second former White House aide to invoke his Fifth Amendment right against self-incrimination when questioned by Congress about former President Joe Biden’s cognitive decline and the use of an autopen to sign official documents.
Wednesday’s incident is just the latest scandal to explode from Jill Biden’s office on Capitol Hill.
Bernal, former assistant to the president and senior advisor to the first lady, appeared for a closed-door deposition on Wednesday after being compelled by subpoena.
House Oversight Committee Chairman James Comer said he only got to ask two questions before Bernal invoked his constitutional rights and would only plead the Fifth: “Was Joe Biden fit to exercise the duties of the president?” and “Did any unelected official or family member execute the duties of the presidency?”
“During his deposition today, Mr. Bernal pleaded the Fifth when asked if any unelected official or family members executed the duties of the President and if Joe Biden ever instructed him to lie about his health,” Comer said in a statement.
Bernal departed without taking reporter questions, following the same pattern as Biden’s former personal physician Kevin O’Connor, who also took the Fifth last Friday when asked if he was ever told to “lie about the president’s health” or believed the president was “unfit to execute his duties.”
House Oversight Committee Chairman James Comer had issued a subpoena for Bernal after he refused to sit for a transcribed interview.
In his subpoena letter, Comer wrote:
Given your close connection with both former President Biden and former First Lady Jill Biden, the Committee sought to understand if you contributed to an effort to hide former President Biden’s fitness to serve from the American people. You have refused the Committee’s request. However, to advance the Committee’s oversight and legislative responsibilities and interests, your testimony is critical.”
[Leadership] seeks information about your assessment of and relationship with former President Biden to explore whether the time has come for Congress to revisit potential legislation to address the oversight of presidents’ fitness to serve pursuant to its authority under Section 4 of the Twenty-Fifth Amendment or to propose changes to the Twenty-Fifth Amendment itself.
Rep. Byron Donalds called Bernal’s refusal to answer questions evidence of “corruption at the highest level.”
“If you cannot, say, answer a simple question about Joe Biden’s capabilities, then that further demonstrates that he was not in charge of his administration,” Donalds said. “And if he was not in charge of his administration, then every order, every bill that was signed, every memorandum, as far as I’m concerned, are null and void.”
Jill Biden herself should “come in here and answer questions” after her deputy declined to do so, Donalds said. “I think Kamala Harris needs to come in and tell us what she knew and when she knew it” too, the congressman said.
Comer said the investigation may conclude with a subpoena of the former president himself.
“We’re gonna continue our investigation. I think that the American people are concerned,” Comer said. “They’re concerned that there were people making decisions in the White House that were not only unelected but no one to this day knows who they were.”
“This is a historic scandal and Americans demand transparency and accountability.”
Bernal was originally slated to appear last month for a voluntary transcribed interview, but he and his lawyers suddenly refused after the Trump administration announced it was waiving executive privilege rights for him and several other former White House staffers.
“Now that the White House has waived executive privilege, it’s abundantly clear that Anthony Bernal – Jill Biden’s so-called ‘work husband’ – never intended to be transparent about Joe Biden’s cognitive decline and the ensuing cover-up,” Comer said in late June.
The investigation centers on allegations that Biden’s former top White House aides covered up his obvious mental and physical decline while in office, and question if executive actions were commissioned via autopen without the president’s full knowledge.
Biden told The New York Times that he “made every decision” regarding executive clemencies issued during his term, but emails showed White House chief of staff Jeff Zients wielded the autopen to approve 25 warrants for pardons and commutations between December and January.
The autopen was used for pardons including General Mark Milley, the former chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, and members of the Biden family who received unprecedented preemptive pardons on January 20.
In some cases, staff secretary Stefanie Feldman used only emails from other aides claiming they had the president’s approval before putting documents into the autopen for signatures, The New York Times reported, even when the aides who drafted the orders weren’t in the room with Biden.
Trump has called the alleged autopen abuse criminal.
“That’s a crime to do that to the country,” Trump said previously. “I don’t think he knew he was doing it. I think that people took over the autopen, they got things signed that shouldn’t have been signed.”