President Joe Biden said on Friday that he has confidence in Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin after the Pentagon waited three days to tell the White House that the top defense official was in the intensive care unit.
Biden also affirmed that Austin had a “lapse in judgment” by not telling the White House about his hospitalization earlier.
The president’s comments were in response to reporters’ questions when he stopped at a coffee shop in Allentown, Penn.
A journalist asked the president, “Do you have confidence in Secretary Austin?”
“I do,” Biden responded.
“Was it a lapse in judgment for him not to tell you earlier?” the journalist asked.
“Yes,” Biden said.
White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre has previously said during press conferences that the White House has “complete confidence” in Austin, but Friday was the first time the president himself has said he still has confidence in the secretary.
Austin was hospitalized earlier this month days after undergoing surgery for prostate cancer. He was taken by an ambulance to a hospital on Jan. 1 and transferred to the ICU the following day, but his team did not inform the White House about the secretary’s hospitalization until Jan 4.
Austin acknowledged scrutiny over the delay in his hospitalization disclosure, saying in a statement that he committed to doing better.
“I also understand the media concerns about transparency and I recognize I could have done a better job ensuring the public was appropriately informed. I commit to doing better,” Austin said in a Jan. 6 statement. “But this is important to say: this was my medical procedure, and I take full responsibility for my decisions about disclosure.”
Source: | This article originally belongs to Nbcnews.com
