President Joe Biden’s spokesman for oversight and investigations is reportedly leaving the White House to be a top communications official for Vice President Kamala Harris’ campaign, people familiar with the move told The Washington Post.
Following the release of special counsel Robert Hur’s investigation into Biden’s handling of classified documents, Ian Sams took up the response to the report, downplaying the concerns about the 81-year-old’s fitness for office. Sams will join the campaign as a senior national spokesperson with the goal of helping Harris “channel her voice and style,” people familiar with the move told The Washington Post.
Sams often headed up the administration’s response to the impeachment inquiry into Biden as well as the special counsel investigation. In Hur’s report, in which he declined to charge Biden, the special counsel described the president as an “elderly man with a poor memory.” In response, Sams called Hur’s comments “gratuitous.”
The White House attempted to discredit Hur’s observations about the president’s fitness through various arguments, including the fact that he is a registered Republican. (RELATED: FLASHBACK: Democrats Had No Problem With Robert Hur Until He Became A Thorn For Joe Biden)
“When you are the first special counsel in history not to indict anybody, there is pressure to criticize and to make, you know, statements that maybe and otherwise you wouldn’t make,” Sams said in a February press briefing.
Sams later addressed a letter to the press, asking them to tone down their coverage of the special counsel report.
![Ian Sams, White House Counsel To President Joe Biden, speaks to members of the media outside the White House on March 12, 2024 in Washington, DC. Sams spoke on Special Counsel Robert Hur’s testimony today before the House Judicary Committee about President Biden's classified documents investigation. (Photo by Kevin Dietsch/Getty Images)](https://cdn01.dailycaller.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/08/GettyImages-2079241735-scaled.jpg)
Ian Sams, White House Counsel To President Joe Biden, speaks to members of the media outside the White House on March 12, 2024 in Washington, DC. Sams spoke on Special Counsel Robert Hur’s testimony today before the House Judiciary Committee about President Biden’s classified documents investigation. (Photo by Kevin Dietsch/Getty Images)
The White House’s spokesman for oversight and investigations also frequently handled the response to House Republicans’ impeachment inquiry into Biden.
In September, the House Oversight Committee released a September report showing that Hunter Biden’s Chinese business associates sent the first son at least $250,000 worth of wires with Joe Biden’s Delaware home listed as the beneficiary address. Sams dismissed the report, calling House Republicans’ claims “bananas.”
“Imagine them arguing that, if someone stayed at their parents’ house during the pandemic, listed it as their permanent address for work, and got a paycheck, the parents somehow also worked for the employer,” Sams tweeted. “It’s bananas. Yet this is what extreme House Republicans have sunken to.”
Other White House officials are joining Sams in leaving the White House, according to the Washington Post, including Kristen Orthman, the principal deputy communications director.
Nearly four weeks into Harris’ campaign, the vice president has yet to sit down for an interview or conduct a press conference. The Trump campaign has a plan to drag Harris out of her basement campaign, officials previously told the Daily Caller, and it begins with sending Senator J.D. Vance to follow the Vice President on the campaign trail. (RELATED: ‘Dam Is Going To Break’: Trump Insiders Forecast Counterattack Against Kamala’s Basement Campaign)
“To highlight that, Senator Vance and President Trump are showing up where Kamala Harris is not,” a campaign spokesperson, granted anonymity to preview strategy, told the Caller. The spokesperson pointed out that Trump attended the National Association of Black Journalists conference when Harris did not. Trump has also appeared with non-traditional media personalities, including streamer Adin Ross and Elon Musk.
“Senator Vance is doing the same by going to the same places that Kamala Harris is going but refusing to take questions. Anyone can show up in a state and read off of a script, off a teleprompter, and then leave 20 minutes later, that’s exactly what Joe Biden was doing, and it didn’t work for him. We’re not going to let it work,” the spokesperson continued.