This week, Karine Jean-Pierre made her historic debut as White House press secretary this week. And after watching her first four performances as the president’s spokesperson, only one word sums it all up: amateur.
On 5/16/2022, White House press Sec. Jean-Pierre said the administration has been “talking about” the shortage since February and that it is a “top priority” for Biden. Jean-Pierre told reporters that the administration is working “24/7” to address the formula shortage but could not name a point person in charge of the response. “This is something he is focusing on very acutely and again I said 24/7 we’ve been working on this since we have learned about this back in February.” Jean-Pierre said during the daily briefing about Biden, calling the issue “one of the presidents top priorities.” “His team has been working overtime to make sure that we get formula back on the shelves, and we want to do this in a safe way,” Jean-Pierre told reporters, adding that she would get back to them on specific briefings, meetings and calls the president made regarding the issue in February.
Biden bristled when asked by reporters on Friday if he could have acted sooner to fix the crisis. “If we had been better mind readers, I guess we could’ve, but we moved as the problem became apparent to us,” Biden said. “I’ll answer the baby formula question because, all of a sudden, it’s on the front page of every newspaper,” Biden grumbled.
Jean-Pierre repeated many times, “You’ve heard us talk about this, you’ve heard colleagues talking about what we have done since February,” Jean-Pierre said. “We’ve been working on this 24/7.” Jean-Pierre refused to offer a timeline for when supplies of baby formula would return to normal. “What I can say is there are a lot of dates floating around out there,” she said.
On 5/18/2022, The Dow dropped over 1,100 points for its worst day since 2020, ending the day 14 percent lower than at the beginning of the year. The Nasdaq Composite dropped nearly 5% and the S&P 500 4%. Since the start of the year, the benchmark S&P has fallen more than 16%, close to bears Market Area. There are growing fears that the Fed will cause a recession. When asked, Jean-Pierre says of the administration’s attention to the stock market: “We do not—that’s not something we keep an eye on every day.” “Nothing has changed in the way we view the stock market,” Jean-Pierre told reporters. “It’s not something we monitor every day, so I’m not going to comment on that from here.”
On 5/17/2022, Biden struggled on multiple occasions with names this week. Biden struggled Tuesday to say “AANHPI” during remarks on Asian-American history month. The acronym recently replaced “AAPI” as the most politically correct way of referring to people of Asian and Pacific Islander descent by also incorporating the letters “NH” for Native Hawaiians. The official White House transcript quoted Biden as saying, “AAN- — NH — PI — aye, aye, aye, aye, aye.” Biden goes to war with his tongue and loses – stumbles through presser with Nordic leaders in latest embarrassment.
On 5/20/2022, Kamala Harris delivered remarks on electric school buses at Meridian High School in Falls Church, Virginia. Kamala Harris had some inspiring words for the attendees as she announced a new national initiative for electric school buses. “Think about it: Yellow school buses are our nation’s largest form of mass transit. How ’bout that? Every day — so, yes, and let’s applaud because it gets ’em where they need to go! Ha ha ha!” Harris said.
On 5/19/2022, The House’s Democratic majority overcame some internal opposition to pass a price gouging legislation. The bill was approved along party lines in a vote of 217-207. House GOP Whip Steve Scalise said on the House floor, “If anybody is going to be sued for gouging, it should be the Gouger-in-Chief Joe Biden who has created this problem,” “Stop relying on foreign countries for our energy when we can make it here cleaner, better than anyone in the world and lower gas prices and address this problem. This bill doesn’t do it. We got to bring up the bills that actually fix the problem.” Scalise, the No. 2 House Republican, called the bill an attempt by Democrats “to distract and shift blame from the administration’s self-inflicted energy and inflation crisis.”
On 5/19/2022, Sec. Granholm was questioned by Sen. Hawley on what Biden Admin is doing to lower energy prices & whether she believes policies put forth by Biden are to blame for the higher costs. Citing the cost of gasoline in his home state of Missouri, as well as projections for even higher gasoline prices during the summer months, Hawley asked Granholm whether she believed the current energy crisis Americans are facing is “acceptable.” “No it is not,” she said.
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