Staffers of former President Joe Biden offered a scathing assessment of former Press Secretary Karine Jean-Pierre’s tell-all book about the weeks leading up to his decision to drop out of the 2024 race.
Independent: A Look Inside a Broken White House, Outside the Party Lines will also detail Jean-Pierre’s decision to leave the Democratic Party following its “betrayal” of Biden and will urge readers to abandon the two-party system in a “hard-hitting yet hopeful critique,” according to the book description from Legacy Lit, a division of Hachette.
Within just one day of the announcement, two dozen former Biden administration officials had already lined up to blast the project to Axios.
For years, many of those officials had thought Jean-Pierre was unqualified to hold White House press briefings and was more interested in self-promotion than in promoting the administration, according to Axios. They thought she was untouchable, though, because she was close to former First Lady Jill Biden’s top aide, Anthony Bernal. Now they’re letting loose, and it’s ugly.
“She didn’t know how to manage a team, didn’t know how to shape or deliver a message, and often created more problems than she solved,” one unnamed official said. “She had meltdowns after any interview that asked about a topic not sent over by producers.”
Another official agreed, saying, “The amount of time that was spent coddling [Jean-Pierre] and appeasing her was astronomical compared to our attention on actual matters of substance.”
Jean-Pierre did not respond to Axios’ requests for comment. The Daily Beast has reached out for comment as well.
Another insider all but called Jean-Pierre a hypocrite for enjoying the perks of close proximity to power—including gaining the name recognition required to sell books—and then turning around and trying to position herself as an outsider of the two-party system.
“It’s difficult to see how this is anything but a bizarre cash grab,” the source told Axios.
Jean-Pierre took over as Biden’s press secretary in mid-2022 after previously serving as former Vice President Kamala Harris’ chief of staff. She also worked in the Obama White House.
Sources told Axios her tenure was marred by her work with a New York-based publicist named Gilda Squire, who was copied on internal emails related to media profiles and appearances by Jean-Pierre—including a Vogue profile.
Squire told Axios in February 2024 that she didn’t work with Jean-Pierre until after the press secretary left the White House.
Asked for comment Wednesday, Squire told Axios reporter Alex Thompson, “Karine and I did not decide to engage on a professional level until after she left the White House. You might want to get your facts straight before you accuse someone of being a liar. Please do not ever contact me again.”
When Thompson sent her a copy of a 2023 email where she was cc’ed about the Vogue article, she didn’t respond further, he said.
In a statement to the Daily Beast, Squire reiterated that she and Jean-Pierre had been friends for years but did not work together professionally until after Biden’s term ended.
“Regarding my being copied on emails, I was clear with the Vogue editor that Karine was a friend, not a client,” Squire said. “The White House press office handled the interview, the shoot, the location, and everything that was necessary for that placement.”
She also said that given that she she worked in public relations and was friends with Jean-Pierre, people who knew about their friendship sometimes reached out to her to invite the former press secretary to events.
“I was copied on emails as her team went through the proper protocols to determine if it was possible,” she said.
