“He looked like he’d blow away in a stiff wind,” Moran told The Daily Beast podcast.
According to Moran, what he witnessed was concerning enough that he believed Biden’s condition deserved journalistic scrutiny. He later noticed Biden’s voice becoming increasingly faint and decided the subject warranted a story.
So Moran approached his editors.
He said he carefully framed his proposal around what reporters and voters could plainly observe rather than attempting to offer a medical diagnosis.
That distinction apparently did not get the pitch very far.
Moran Says ABC Told Him Biden’s Health Was Someone Else’s Beat
Moran recalled sending an email to his editors as “gently and as respectfully” as possible.
The response, according to Moran, was that Biden’s health was “the medical unit’s business, not yours.”
Moran said the reaction effectively ended his attempt to pursue the subject.
His account raises questions about how aggressively major news organizations examined Biden’s age and physical condition before the issue exploded into the center of the 2024 presidential campaign.
The Biden White House repeatedly pushed back against suggestions that the president was incapable of performing his duties. Questions about Biden’s stamina, schedule and public appearances nevertheless became an increasingly significant political issue during his final year in office.
Moran’s story is especially notable because he was not describing an anonymous outsider complaining about media coverage. He was an ABC correspondent saying that he personally saw something he considered newsworthy, proposed covering it, and was told the subject belonged elsewhere.
ABC Later Cut Ties With Moran After His Trump-Miller Post
There is another chapter to Moran’s relationship with ABC.
In June 2025, Moran published a social-media post attacking President Donald Trump and White House adviser Stephen Miller.
Moran described Miller as “richly endowed with the capacity for hatred” and a “world-class hater.”
ABC quickly suspended Moran. Days later, the network announced that it would not renew his contract.
“We are at the end of our agreement with Terry Moran and based on his recent post – which was a clear violation of ABC News policies – we have made the decision to not renew,” an ABC spokesperson said.
The network said its journalists were expected to meet standards of objectivity, fairness and professionalism.
The two episodes inevitably invite comparison: Moran says his effort to examine Biden’s condition was rejected internally, while his highly opinionated comments about Trump and Miller ultimately resulted in ABC ending its relationship with him.
Those facts do not by themselves establish why ABC made its earlier editorial decision, but Moran’s account provides a rare glimpse into the internal newsroom debate over Biden’s condition.
ABC’s Recent Controversies Add Another Layer
The revelation also comes after ABC News faced a costly legal dispute involving Trump.
In 2024, Trump sued ABC and anchor George Stephanopoulos over statements Stephanopoulos made concerning the E. Jean Carroll civil cases.
ABC eventually agreed to a settlement that included a $15 million contribution toward a presidential foundation and museum associated with Trump, plus $1 million in legal fees. ABC also published an editor’s note expressing regret over the statements.
For critics of legacy media, Moran’s latest disclosure will likely deepen longstanding questions about how editorial judgment was exercised during the Biden presidency.
And ABC was hardly the only major newsroom forced to revisit its handling of Biden’s condition.
Jake Tapper Later Co-Authored a Book About Biden’s Decline
CNN anchor Jake Tapper faced scrutiny of his own after co-authoring Original Sin: President Biden’s Decline, Its Cover-Up, and His Disastrous Choice to Run Again with Axios reporter Alex Thompson.
The book drew on hundreds of interviews and documented concerns among officials, donors, aides and other political figures about Biden’s condition and his decision to seek another term.
That stood in contrast to an infamous 2020 exchange involving Tapper and Lara Trump.
When she questioned Biden’s cognitive fitness during a CNN interview, Tapper pushed back sharply.
“I think you have absolutely no standing to diagnose somebody’s cognitive decline,” Tapper told her.
Years later, Tapper was publicly discussing evidence that Biden’s deterioration had been significantly more serious behind closed doors than the public understood.
Tapper has since addressed criticism of his earlier coverage, saying that “acknowledging errors builds trust, and being defensive about them further erodes it.”
His book with Thompson describes extensive efforts by Biden’s inner circle to manage concerns surrounding the president’s limitations. NPR’s 2025 interview with Tapper similarly reported his contention that the public did not understand the full extent of Biden’s problems while he was president.
Moran’s Account Leaves ABC With Questions to Answer
Moran’s disclosure does not establish that ABC deliberately concealed Biden’s condition to help his campaign. ABC’s precise reasoning for rejecting Moran’s proposed story has not been independently established beyond Moran’s account.
But what Moran says happened is significant on its own.
A veteran correspondent traveled alongside the president, observed changes he believed deserved scrutiny, and attempted to persuade his newsroom to investigate.
According to Moran, ABC told him the subject was not his responsibility.
That decision looks more consequential in hindsight, after Biden’s age and condition became one of the defining controversies of the 2024 election and journalists subsequently produced extensive reporting about concerns that existed behind the scenes.
Moran’s fundamental argument is straightforward: journalists should be permitted to investigate what they observe.
For news organizations that insist their first obligation is to inform the public without fear or favor, his account presents an uncomfortable question.
When one of ABC’s own reporters believed there was a story about the sitting president’s condition, why wasn’t he allowed to pursue it?
