Who would have thought that Joe Biden would manage to replace his last press secretary with someone even more shameless? That was a feat that seemed almost improbable as Jen Psaki left the podium to make the natural move to hosting her own show on MSNBC.
With the hiring of Karine Jean-Pierre, though, Biden pulled it off. With a mix of abject dishonesty and sheer incompetence that would make any political operative blush, she has managed to cement herself as perhaps the worst press secretary since the invention of the position, and she’s not slowing down anytime soon.
(Related: Politico Takes Lying for Biden to Another Level in Rewriting of History on the Debt Ceiling)
On Tuesday, Jean-Pierre stood in front of the press corps fielding questions about the continuing debt ceiling negotiations. When pressed on whether the White House waited too long to engage with Republicans on a deal to avoid a default on the national debt, this is what she said.
"Did the president wait too long to engage with the Republicans on the negotiations?"
Karine Jean-Pierre: "The president's been trying to engage with Republicans for months now!" pic.twitter.com/bOIIQmN3Lw
— RNC Research (@RNCResearch) May 23, 2023
I’m sorry, what? The president has been trying to engage with Republicans for months? In what alternate universe did she witness that? Because last I checked, less than two weeks prior to this writing, the White House was still insisting that they wouldn’t negotiate at all on the debt ceiling. Does that qualify as engagement these days?
The funny thing about the internet is that what is put on it stays there forever. So while Jean-Pierre may be able to gaslight the mostly compliant press in the room who won’t dare fact-check her, the rest of us can simply use our search engine thingies and do it ourselves.
It took me less than a minute to find the contradictory clip shortly after her latest comments were made. Townhall also put together a helpful montage for those who want to make sure the quotes are accurate.
Shameless pic.twitter.com/Nhh7Df2qAp
— Bonchie (@bonchieredstate) May 23, 2023
KJP IN MAY: "We are not going to negotiate over the debt limit…"
KJP TODAY: "We are negotiating on the budget. I've always been very clear about that…" pic.twitter.com/9jKKsWAVi9
— Townhall.com (@townhallcom) May 23, 2023
But hey, if Jean-Pierre’s own words aren’t enough, Reuters wrote on May 2nd that Biden wouldn’t negotiate on the debt ceiling. In late April, The Washington Post reported the same thing, saying that the White House had “reiterated” its refusal to enter negotiations. And of course, that clip of Jean-Pierre is from May 12th, not even two weeks before her flip-flop claiming Biden has been trying to engage all along.
No one is buying these lies. We all have eyes and ears, and that’s why even the AP-NORC poll shows that the vast majority of Americans want a debt ceiling deal that includes deficit reduction. Republicans have done their part. They passed a reasonable deal that does nothing but cap spending levels at an already eye-watering mark. Jean-Pierre and the rest of the White House comms team were caught flat-footed, and now they are left with nothing but obvious lies. Good luck to them with that strategy.
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