The White House communications team has been forced to play defense over the last several weeks as the president continues to come under public scrutiny for apparent gaffes and slips-ups.
During remarks Monday commemorating the 22nd anniversary of the terrorist attacks on Sept. 11, 2001, President Joe Biden claimed that he had visited Ground Zero the day after the attack, a statement which the White House could not provide evidence for, instead pointing to a later visit on Sept. 20, 2001. The president’s comments added to the list of recent gaffes that his staff has been forced to answer for. Later on Monday, the president’s official Twitter account reportedly deleted a post after it came under fire for erroneously featuring the leader of the Vietnamese national assembly in a statement that was meant to thank the country’s president, the New York Post reported. (RELATED: Reporter Presses Jean-Pierre On Biden Taking Vacations As Americans Struggle With Inflation)
A day prior, a Biden staffer rushed to cut off the president during a press conference in Vietnam as Biden gave a rambling response to a reporter’s question.
“I’ll tell you what, I don’t know about you, but I’m gonna go to bed,” Biden said while trying to answer the reporter’s question.
“Thank you everybody, this ends the press conference,” a staffer is heard saying off-screen after Biden attempted to answer a follow-up question.
Biden appeared to gaffe earlier in the week after he wandered out of a Medal of Honor presentation ceremony on Sept. 5, leaving the award recipient on the stage, a move which reporters pressed White House press secretary Jean-Pierre about the next day during a briefing. Jean-Pierre defended the president’s actions, claiming that the White House had planned for Biden to exit the ceremony once there was a pause in the programming in order to avoid contact with attendees after potentially being exposed to COVID-19.
“You all reported that. You noticed that he left when there was a pause in the program because again he wanted to minimize his impact on folks who were there,” Jean-Pierre said during the briefing.
Jean-Pierre had previously noted that the president would be masking when in a close vicinity to others, though he was maskless when presenting the Medal of Honor.
Biden wandered out of the Medal of Honor ceremony in an effort to avoid contact with attendees after potentially being exposed to COVID-19, press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre told reporters Wednesday.
“It was planned”
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— Reagan Reese (@reaganreese_) September 6, 2023
Ahead of delivering remarks on Sept. 6, Biden walked into a room of reporters holding a mask in his hand, creating confusion on whether the president was adhering to the White House COVID-19 guidelines Jean-Pierre told reporters about.
“They keep telling me, because it has to be 10 days or something, I gotta keep wearing it,” Biden said, referring to his mask. “Don’t tell them I didn’t have it when I walked in.”
Nearly a month earlier, Jean-Pierre was pressed after the president falsely claimed that he had declared a national climate emergency, “practically speaking,” while being interviewed by The Weather Channel.
“This is a president that has taken really an ambitious approach to climate change,” Jean-Pierre said when asked on CNN about the president’s gaffe.
Amid the gaffes, concerns about the 80-year-old president’s ability to serve as the leader of the country have increased: just 26% of Americans think Biden has the stamina to serve as the president, according to a September CNN poll, conducted by SSRS Research, an independent polling company. Around 49% of Democrats believe that Biden has the sharpness to effectively be the president, a 14% decline since March.
The president defended himself against doubts about his sharpness and age during a Labor Day speech in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.
“Someone said, ‘You know, that Biden, he’s getting old,’” Biden said.
“Well, guess what, guess what … the only thing that comes with age is a little bit of wisdom,” Biden continued. “I’ve been doing this longer than anybody, and guess what, I’m going to continue to do it, with your help.”