“Senate Republicans plan to launch their own investigation next month that delves into the alleged “conspiracy” behind former President Joe Biden’s cognitive decline,” Fox News reports.

“The lawmakers are still gathering witnesses for the probe, which would be the first full congressional committee hearing on the subject.”

Said Sen. Eric Schmitt (R-MO): “It’s time to expose how a cadre of Biden aides and family members were the de facto commander in chief, while President Biden was sidelined. I look forward to getting the American people the answers they deserve.”

Wall Street Journal: “Some major donors have been reluctant to give money to his presidential library, and some allies privately worry it will not open during his lifetime… Biden’s speaking fees, which can range from $300,000 to $500,000, are below what former President Barack Obama commands… So far, few organizations have been willing to pay for Biden.”

“Making matters more difficult, Biden faces pressure that other past presidents didn’t. He aims to quickly amass an inheritance for his grandchildren… His son Hunter, with five children, has struggled to find a professional footing and another son, Beau, died in 2015, leaving prongs of the family for whom the Bidens have taken on some financial responsibility.”

“The most significant hurdle is a hardening view that his presidency failed to deliver on its core promise of moving the country past Donald Trump.”

Mark Leibovich: “Just as scores of Republicans in Washington have been privately horrified over the years by Trump’s conduct while they’ve smothered him in rhetorical smooches on the record, Democrats confidentially expressed near-unanimous awareness of Biden’s feeble state, but claimed the exact opposite in front of cameras and microphones.”

Playbook: “There are accusations spreading like wildfire — including from Trump’s son, Don Jr. — that aspects of this tragic diagnosis stretch back further than last week, and that Biden’s cancer was kept quiet while he was in office. Certainly, plenty of doctors say it would be unusual — though far from impossible — for prostate cancer this serious to suddenly emerge out of the blue. Far-right activist Laura Loomer’s claims from back in July 2024 that Biden had a terminal illness are now being reamplified by his critics. Pro-MAGA X users are also reupping Biden’s statement to camera in 2022, when he bluntly said he had cancer, which aides insisted at the time was a misunderstanding.”

“None of which proves anything. Publicly available facts are sparse, and plenty of people are outraged this is even being discussed at such a sensitive time. But it does matter.”

President Trump expressed his condolences after former President Biden announced he had been diagnosed with an aggressive form of prostate cancer.

Said Trump: “Melania and I are saddened to hear about Joe Biden’s recent medical diagnosis. We extend our warmest and best wishes to Jill and the family, and we wish Joe a fast and successful recovery.”

Former President Joe Biden was diagnosed with an “aggressive form” of prostate cancer, according to a statement from his personal office Sunday, and it has spread to his bones, CNN reports.

Biden and his family “are reviewing treatment options with his physicians.”

“We might very well lose the greatest country that this world has ever known. And it might be in part because of the decision that Biden and those around him made to run for re-election.”

— Beto O’Rourke, quoted by The Guardian.

“A lot of us have covered Joe Biden’s aging, and the accompanying inability to do things the way he used to, throughout his Presidency. But what we uncovered, after the election was over, when all the people that we had been talking to for months and years, and all of the people who had been saying, ‘He’s fine, he’s fine,’ were suddenly willing to talk about what had been going on. It was only after the election that we were able to get the insider point of view.”

— Jake Tapper, in an interview with the New Yorker.

“For much of his time in the White House, former President Joe Biden offered a quick rebuttal to those raising concerns about his age: ‘Watch me,’ he said,” the New York Times reports.

“Yet, in the end, it may be the sound of Mr. Biden’s own voice that proves what his aides worked furiously, and spent hundreds of millions of campaign dollars, to try to keep the public from seeing with its own eyes.”

“The five-hour-and-10-minute audio recording of a special counsel’s interview with Mr. Biden on Oct. 8 and 9, 2023, shows a president struggling to recall dates and details, whose thoughts seem jumbled as he tries to recreate events that had occurred just a few years earlier.”

Axios: Biden’s reversal on classified document flustered his attorneys.

“Amid long, uncomfortable pauses, Joe Biden struggled to recall when his son died, when he left office as vice president, what year Donald Trump was elected or why he had classified documents he shouldn’t have had, according to audio obtained of his October 2023 interviews with special counsel Robert Hur,” Axios reports.

“The newly released recordings of Biden having trouble recalling such details — while occasionally slurring words and muttering — shed light on why his White House refused to release the recordings last year, as questions mounted about his mental acuity.”

“The audio also appears to validate Hur’s assertion that jurors in a trial likely would have viewed Biden as ‘a sympathetic, well-meaning, elderly man with a poor memory.’”

Steve Schale: “There is no playbook for navigating the post-presidency, especially in this modern era. For President Joe Biden, the story of his life has been one of getting back up: after his wife and daughter died, after two failed runs for president, after losing Beau, after navigating Hunter’s challenges, and now after leaving the presidency in a way he had not planned.”

“There is also no real playbook for a hack after the presidential run either. And like so many who love the Boss, his appearance on The View last week just didn’t feel right.”

“Ten years ago, I found myself landing in Bidenworld after opening my mouth to say a few things others were thinking. Now, out of my admiration for the Boss, I will open my mouth one last time: I like, respect, and admire Joe Biden, and I have a hunch that over time, history will treat much of his presidency well. At the same time, I wish he would stop litigating it. It isn’t helping.”

“Democratic operatives have urged Joe Biden to avoid public appearances as dramatic revelations about his cognitive state during the 2024 presidential race hit the party’s efforts to oppose Donald Trump,” the Financial Times reports.

“The former US president has given his first interviews in recent days since leaving office — a bid to defend his legacy just as damning accounts reveal his mental decline in office and his inner circle’s efforts to conceal it.”

“But strategists said Biden’s reappearance was causing more damage to a party that is struggling to recover from Kamala Harris’s shattering defeat to Trump in November.”

Sen. Chris Murphy (D-CT) said there’s “no doubt” that former President Joe Biden suffered cognitive decline in office and that it would have been better for the party if he hadn’t run for reelection, Politico reports.

Said Murphy: “There’s no doubt about it. The debate is whether it was enough that it compromised his ability to act as chief executive.”

President Biden’s inner circle “grew so small in 2023 and 2024 that even members of his Cabinet weren’t included,” CNN reports.

Said one Cabinet member: “Access dropped off considerably in 2024, and I didn’t interact with him as much.”

The Cabinet member added: “Yes, the president is ‘making the decisions,’ but if the inner circle is shaping them in such a way, is it really a decision? Are they leading him to something?”