House Oversight GOP slams Andrew Bates for ‘leaked’ autopen probe remarks

FIRST ON FOX: The House Oversight Committee is slamming former Biden spokesman Andrew Bates after he accused Republican lawmakers of having a misguided focus in his opening remarks during the panel’s autopen probe.

Bates, the latest former White House official to be interviewed by House investigators, affirmed ex-President Joe Biden’s leadership while criticizing his successor in an opening statement obtained by Fox News Digital via a source familiar.

An Oversight Committee spokesperson said in response, “Andrew Bates was part of the Biden cognitive decline cover-up and he’s delusional.”

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“His so-called opening statement — leaked in the middle of his transcribed interview and not even read at the time it was leaked — peddled the same fantasy he’s been trying to sell the American people. The public has rejected Bates’ spin and witnessed President Biden’s decline with their own eyes,” the spokesperson said. 

“And just this week, new records revealed that President Biden neither approved — nor may have even been consulted on — thousands of pardons. This is a historic scandal with massive repercussions.”

Bates said in the opening statement provided to Fox News Digital, “I was proud to support Joe Biden as President because we believe in the same values. In the White House, it was universally understood that Joe Biden was in charge. That is completely consistent with my personal experience with the President.”

“Now someone else with a very different character is in charge,” the statement said.

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Bates accused Oversight Committee Republicans of “spending taxpayer dollars investigating Joe Biden — an honorable man under whom the economy performed far better than it is today — while turning a blind eye to corruption under Donald Trump.”

He went on to rip President Donald Trump’s tariffs, accuse him of “illegally trying to take over the Federal Reserve,” and criticize the president’s personal investments in cryptocurrency and acceptance of a jet from Qatar to be used for official business, among other items.

“To my knowledge, none of the above are being investigated. As a taxpayer and private citizen, I feel that is wrong,” Bates said, according to the written comments.

House Oversight Committee Chair James Comer, R-Ky., has been investigating whether Biden’s senior aides covered up signs of mental decline in the former president, and whether any executive decisions were signed off on via autopen without the then-leader’s full awareness.

They’re looking in particular at the litany of clemency orders that Biden signed in the latter half of his term, though Biden allies have dismissed the probe as politically motivated.