Welcome to Inside the Hive from Vanity Fair, a podcast about power and the people who love it.

I'm Michael Calderon, the editor of The Hive at Vanity Fair.

And I'm Claire Hoarth, executive editor at VF, and I'm at a little media gathering.

And I can guarantee our guests on the show today are going to be the hot topic of conversation out here.

This week, Claire and I are coming to you with an interview with Jake Tapper and Alex Thompson,

the authors of a new book, Original Sin, President Biden's decline, its cover-up, and his disastrous

choice to run again. The book chronicles President Joe Biden's cognitive decline before and during his presidency

and how a group of advisors and some of his family helped cover up the extent of his condition,

which ultimately led to the collapse of his campaign in the summer of 2024.

Original sin has kick-started a conversation around the former president, as well as the Democrats,

and the press, which Tapper, who's a CNN anchor the former president, as well as the Democrats, and the press,

which Tapper, who's a CNN anchor, and Thompson, an Axios national political correspondent,

say bears some of the blame.

We had this interview booked before Sunday's shocking and tragic news that President Biden

has been diagnosed with an aggressive form of prostate cancer.

So now this flurry of second-guessing around his candidacy has shifted to an outpouring of

emotion and support.

It's been a headspending few days in American politics, and we've got a lot to talk about.

So let's get right to it.

Alex, Jake.

Welcome to the show.

Thank you so much.

...