WATCH: Jen Psaki Says Biden Answered More Than 1,000 Questions Last Year When Grilled About Press Freedom Report
White House Press Secretary Jen Psaki responded to a press watchdog report by telling reporters that President Joe Biden answered over 1,000 questions from the press during his first year in office.
When Ms. Psaki briefed reporters Thursday, she was asked to respond to a report from the Committee to Protect Journalists in which the group expressed several concerns.
Psaki expressed surprise at some of the concerns, and delivered a lengthy response that included some back-of-the-napkin math on how often Biden takes questions from reporters:
Q The Committee to Protect Journalists report questioning — saying freedom advocates are concerned with your administration in terms of access to the President for reporters, timely responses — you know, the requests we have (inaudible) —
MS. PSAKI: Timely responses from our press office?
Q From the press office —
MS. PSAKI: Oh, I’m surprised to hear that.
Q — to various queries on various topics.
MS. PSAKI: “To queries.” Okay.
Q Slow responses to requests for information — let me (inaudible) from that.
MS. PSAKI: Okay.
Q The request to extradite Julian Assange, the restrictions on access to the media at the southern border, limited help for Afghan journalists. Can you give us a comment, from your perspective, on how you see those things playing out and what some of these criticisms are?
MS. PSAKI: Well, I haven’t read the report. But let me — well, I would say, broadly speaking, that when I spoke with the President about this job, I mean, one of our — one of the things he conveyed to me very clearly was resetting the tone with the media was a big priority for him, and ensuring that there was a respect even when there’s a point of contention or a difficult conversation, or a back-and-forth — that that is part of democracy.
But our objective is to — has been to re-instill normalcy and engagement with reporters, whether we agree or disagree, whether there is a partisan tilt to an outlet or not. And I think we have conducted ourselves accordingly.
And always we’re working to continue to be responsive. I would say — I would — I would say to inquiries of probably tens of thousands, if not more, does not to me sound like a data point, but I will look closer at the report.
The other thing I would say is that, you know, the President has taken questions at about two hundred- — on about 250 occasions over the past year. If you average about three questions per time, that’s about 750 questions he’s taken. That does not include the formal press conference he did in March, other press conferences he’s done. That’s about three. So let’s say 1,000, just to be generous there. That’s about three questions a day.
I think the American people have seen him out there answering questions. He will continue to be. That’s an important part of his engagement with the press and the public, and that will be a part of how we continue to conduct ourselves.
That criticism has been raised frequently in Biden’s first year, and Psaki has previously said, of the informal Q&A sessions she referenced here, that “President Biden has answered questions twice as many times at these events than President Trump did at this point in time.”
President Biden participated in 6 solo and 3 joint press conferences last year, while former President Donald Trump had participated in 1 solo and 20 joint pressers his first year in office.
Watch above via The White House.
