CNN anchor asks just the right question about Hunter Biden's speech to send Biden spox into spiral: 'Ended up being not true'

White House spokesman Ian Sams became defensive on Thursday when CNN anchor Phil Mattingly confronted him over the changing narrative about President Joe Biden's alleged involvement in Hunter Biden's business schemes.

For years, President Biden said that he never discussed business with his son. But that narrative began to change earlier this year after Devon Archer, one of Hunter's longtime business associates, testified to Congress that Biden had conversed with his son's business associates on numerous occasions.

On Wednesday, the goalposts moved farther when Hunter Biden gave an exceptionally specific defense of his father.

"Let me state as clearly as I can: my father was not financially involved in my business," the first son said on Capitol Hill while defying a congressional subpoena.

On "CNN This Morning," Mattingly highlighted the "evolution" of the narrative and pressed Sams about the specificity of the Hunter's statement.

"Was that an intentional point of clarity, do you think?" Mattingly asked.

Sams, however, became immediately defensive.

"I actually dispute the whole premise of that question," he said.

Sams accused Mattingly of using "one of Jim Jordan's favorite little shiny objects— to try to take a semantic thing and make an argument" against the president.

But Mattingly immediately shut down the accusation.

"With respect, I'm not siding with Jim Jordan here. I was in some of the White House press briefings where it was said explicitly the president did not talk to his son about business dealing. That is very clearly not the case and I think the statement from the White House has changed," the CNN anchor responded. "I'm not saying this is like an impeachable offense or some grand indictment, but it is a fact that the president said one thing that ended up being not true."

Sams responded by accusing Mattingly of being dishonest.

"I dispute that that's true. That is not true. The truth is that he wasn't in business with his son," Sams said.

"Again, I'm not saying that he was in business with his son," Mattingly fired back.

The last part of the exchange is telling. Mattingly never accused Biden of being involved in Hunter's business schemes; he was simply questioning the White House's changing narrative. Yet Sams twisted himself into a knot — ultimately not addressing the question — to defend President Biden from allegations that Mattingly never raised.

Sams' response thus raises the question: if there is nothing to read into Hunter Biden's specific defense of his father, why dodge Mattingly's question?

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