President Joe Biden was recently talking about his $2.1 trillion infrastructure plan when he got a little testy with a reporter talking about the Delta Variant, as well as asking a few questions on Afghanistan. Reporters wanted to know about Afghanistan potentially falling to the Taliban once US troops fully withdraw.
Biden had met with Afghan leaders last week to talk about the US support for the Afghan people and received a third question about it a job growth event. The reporter started off “Sir, on Afghanistan,” before Biden cut her off and said, “I’m not going to answer any more questions on Afghanistan.” He said he would take the reporters’ “negative” questions at another time and that he wanted to talk about happy things. I’m sure if someone asked Biden what year it is, he would refuse to answer that too. He doesn’t follow anything off of the script or teleprompter.
Biden bristles when he's asked follow-up questions about Afghanistan, says he wants to celebrate the holiday weekend.
"I'm not gonna answer any more questions on Afghanistan. Look, it's Fourth of July" pic.twitter.com/nl2eQakEYn
— Dave Brown (@dave_brown24) July 2, 2021
The reporter tried to move on to talking about the economy, in which Biden cut her off again and said it’s the holiday weekend and that he’ll answer questions next week. He told the reporter that great things are happening and he’s going to celebrate them.
“Economy’s growing faster than any time in forty years, we’ve got a record number of new jobs, COVID deaths are down ninety percent, wages are up faster than any time in fifteen years, we’re bringing our troops home, all across America people are going to ballgames and doin’ good things, this is good – I’ll answer all your negative questions, not negative, your legitimate questions,” President Biden said.
Biden went on to say “I want to talk about happy things, man.” He concluded that he would answer their legitimate questions at another time and said that the country was on track for a “rational drawdown” of US troops by September, the anniversary of the invasion following the 9/11 attacks. The plans were developed at the end of the Trump Administration to have troops exit the “longest US war on record.” Biden said that he believes the Afghan government can sustain a government but that they’ll probably have “more negotiations” down the road.
White House Press Secretary Jen Psaki tried to defend Biden’s snappy remarks to the reporters, saying that people are “over-reading” into his response to a series of questions on Afghanistan. She said that it was the fourth question he got on the subject and that he was done. Done? Like nap-time done?
“I think what he was trying to convey to all of you is that he is heading into July 4th weekend — a weekend for family, a weekend to celebrate America — and that he was ready to be done answering questions. It wasn’t related to Afghanistan,” Psaki said.
Critics pointed out on social media that “senility” forces Biden to say the quiet parts out loud. Others pointed out how sensitive Biden gets over one or two questions when Trump got about a million confrontational, accusatory questions every day.
“This admin is one of the least transparent or open to questions that I can remember. And that’s with friendly media. I didn’t like Trump and what came out of his mouth and admins mouth, but at least they took questions and responded,” one Twitter user wrote.
Even with 99.99% of the media on Biden’s side, he still can’t handle it.