Sources claim Biden press office broke protocol by editing president's 'garbage' transcript: Report

Anonymous sources told the Associated Press on Thursday that the White House's press office acted independently when it edited and released the transcript of President Joe Biden's call with Hispanic voters on Tuesday. 

The president came under heat this week when he appeared to call supporters of former President Donald Trump "garbage." The comment was in response to a comedian's joke at a Trump rally that Puerto Rico was "a floating island of garbage."

A White House spokesperson told NBC News shortly after the comment went viral that it was directed towards the comedian, and not regular Trump supporters. The press office then released a transcript of the call that appeared to solidify the intent, by changing the quote from "supporters" to "supporter's," with an apostrophe. 

The Associated Press obtained a copy of the email regarding the change in the transcript, which sources confirmed was legitimate. The change to the press transcript was reportedly made after discussing the comment with Biden.

The White House Stenography Office, which is responsible for preparing accurate transcripts for all presidential remarks so the National Archives can accurately preserve them, said the press office's actions were “a breach of protocol and spoilation of transcript integrity between the Stenography and Press Offices.”

“If there is a difference in interpretation, the Press Office may choose to withhold the transcript but cannot edit it independently,” the stenography supervisor wrote, adding, “Our Stenography Office transcript — released to our distro, which includes the National Archives — is now different than the version edited and released to the public by Press Office staff.”

The discrepancy also reportedly arose when the supervisor for the Stenography office was not immediately available to hear the audio and approve the change. There was a two-person team on duty, but any changes have to be approved by the supervisor, per AP.

Misty Severi is an evening news reporter for Just The News. You can follow her on X for more coverage.