A growing number of Democrats are publicly second-guessing their party’s handling of the last election, acknowledging that President Joe Biden’s delayed withdrawal was damaging and in some cases conceding they were too quick to dismiss questions about his age and mental acuity.

Joe Biden’s close circle floated the idea of getting the aging politician a wheelchair if he was re-elected as president, according to a bombshell new book. In Original Sin, CNN’s Jake Tapper and Axios’ Alex Thompson write that the now 82-year-old’s aides were so concerned by his perceived decline that they started scrambling for ideas.

This story is adapted from the forthcoming book "Original Sin: President Biden's Decline, Its Cover-Up, and His Disastrous Choice to Run Again," by CNN's Jake Tapper and Axios' Alex Thompson. Joe Biden's physical deterioration was so severe in 2023 and 2024 that advisers privately discussed the possibility he'd need to use a wheelchair if he won re-election,

Biden reportedly failed to remember top aides’ names and once didn’t recognize George Clooney. Aides also worried he would need a wheelchair.

Jake Tapper and Alex Thompson’s new book is an investigative account of loyalists and family members who shielded the diminished president from full public view.