(Luis Cornelio, Headline USA) Embattled CNN anchor Jake Tapper has enlisted a PR crisis guru amid scathing criticism of his new book, which claims to expose former President Joe Biden’s cognitive decline—despite spending years attacking conservatives for making the same argument.
Tapper and co-author Alex Thompson hired crisis communications expert Risa Heller and her firm Heller Co., to help in their May 20 launch of Original Sin: President Biden’s Decline, Its Cover-up, and His Disastrous Choice to Run Again.
Heller is no stranger to scandal. She represented disgraced figures like former CNN boss Jeff Zucker, who resigned after a secret affair with an employee, and former Rep. Anthony Weiner, infamous for his sexting scandals.
Tapper defended the hire as an apparent bid to make the book’s “rollout as smart as possible.” He also claimed Heller would merely provide “advice.” However, the timing tells a different story.
Heller’s hiring was first reported by Breaker Media and the Daily Beast.
Tapper’s move comes as he faces backlash for dismissing conservative journalists who spent years reporting on Biden’s cognitive decline when it mattered—not months after he stepped away from public office.
In his new book, Tapper claims Biden once discussed putting him in a wheelchair if he won re-election and that he forgot who George Clooney was at a 2024 fundraiser.
Here’s the kicker: outlets like Headline USA covered these developments last year, with President Donald Trump once predicting that Biden would be thrown on a wheelchair.
In a now-infamous exchange with Lara Trump, Tapper scolded her for questioning Biden’s mental acuity.
“How do you think it makes little kids with stutters feel when they see you make a comment like that?” he asked.
“First and foremost, I had no idea that Joe Biden ever suffered from a stutter,” Lara replied. “I think what we see on stage with Joe Biden, Jake, is very clearly a cognitive decline.”
Running to Biden’s defense, Tapper retorted: “It’s so amazing to me—a ‘cognitive decline.’ I think you were mocking his stutter. Yeah. I think you were mocking his stutter and I think you have absolutely no standing to diagnose somebody’s cognitive decline. I would think somebody in the Trump family would be more sensitive to people who do not have medical licenses diagnosing politicians from afar.”
It’s unclear how the book will sell, given that much of its reporting had already been uncovered by other outlets.
