Biden declines Super Bowl interview for second year
Fox News contributor Joe Concha joined 'Fox & Friends First' to discuss Biden declining a Super Bowl interview for the second year in a row and the liberal media panicking over the latest 2024 polls.
For the second year in a row, President Biden will be skipping the traditional pre-Super Bowl interview, putting more of a spotlight on the unprecedented lack of access he has given to the press.
Last year, Biden did not sit down with Fox News when the FOX broadcasting network aired the Super Bowl. This year, CBS is broadcasting the game and the White House revealed last weekend that Biden would, again, not make himself available.
"We hope viewers enjoy watching what they tuned in for — the game," a White House spokesman told Variety.
The decision came just one day before Axios reported that the White House believes Special Counsel Robert Hur, who has been investigating Biden's handling of classified documents, may release his report "as soon as this week" that could include "embarrassing details" about his conduct.
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President Biden's Super Bowl snub continues his months-long streak of avoiding serious news interviews. (Jim Lo Scalzo/EPA/Bloomberg via Getty Images)
Interviews with the current president are few and far between. The last time Biden sat down for a formal news interview with a journalist was incidentally with CBS back in October.
During the Oct. 15 installment of "60 Minutes," CBS correspondent Scott Pelley focused his questions on Biden's reaction to the Oct. 7 terrorist attacks against Israel by Hamas.
While "60 Minutes" is widely regarded as a serious news program, the interview itself wasn't exactly hard-hitting. Some of the questions Pelley posed to the president include "Why do you feel so strongly about speaking to these families [of American hostages in Gaza] personally on Zoom?," "Is getting the American hostages back safely among your highest priorities now?," "Does the dysfunction that we've seen in Congress increase the danger in the world?" and "Why do you feel so strongly? What does Israel mean to you?"
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The interview was panned by Biden's likely 2024 opponent, former President Trump, who wrote on Truth Social that CBS News "led him along like a lost child."
"Each question contained the answer, and was so weakly and apologetically asked that it was a JOKE which should be considered a campaign contribution to the Democrat Party," Trump exclaimed.
The last news interview President Biden granted was back in October with CBS correspondent Scott Pelley for "60 Minutes." (CBS/Screenshot)
Since "60 Minutes," Biden granted interviews with Spanish radio host Tony Arias, CNN's Anderson Cooper on his podcast about grief, comedian Conan O'Brien, and Rev. Al Sharpton on his radio show, generating little to no headlines. He also briefly spoke with NBC's Al Roker during the Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade by phone, as well as Ryan Seacrest during ABC's New Years Eve broadcast, both alongside First Lady Jill Biden.
Perhaps the last time Biden faced hard-hitting questions in an interview setting was back in February 2023 when he was grilled by PBS NewsHour's Judy Woodruff and ABC's David Muir about his classified documents scandal in a pair of sit-downs. What followed was a string of friendly interviews that included "The Daily Show" guest host (and former Obama aide) Kal Penn, Roker, MSNBC's Joe Scarborough, Stephanie Ruhle and Nicolle Wallace, CNN's Fareed Zakaria, British wellness podcast host Jay Shatt, The Weather Channel's Stephanie Abrams and ProPublica's John Harwood.
Notably, none of the president's interviewers have asked him about the growing legal troubles facing his embattled son Hunter Biden since the June indictment by the DOJ. In other words, Biden was able to avoid that subject across roughly a dozen interviews in an eight-month span.
Instead, Biden's interviewers lobbed fairly easy questions and often showered him with praise.
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MSNBC's Nicolle Wallace repeatedly fawned over President Biden during her interview of him last year. (Screenshots/MSNBC)
MSNBC's Wallace raised eyebrows for her giddy June exchange with the president, occurring just days after his son pleaded guilty. CNN's Zakaria told Biden in July that Americans are "impressed" with him and believe he's been a "great president." Harwood kicked off his September interview by admitting "how wrong" he was to doubt that Biden could win the 2020 election.
Biden's string of "friendly" interviews granted by the White House has not gone unnoticed.
"They pretty much made it clear that I don't think they - they see that they may be meeting that standard by putting the president up for interviews with, I would say, friendly talk show hosts and maybe getting their message out on social media," New York Times reporter Zolan Kanno-Youngs said last year.
It's been since May 2023 that a one-on-one interviewer last asked Biden about the troubles facing Hunter when MSNBC's Ruhle sympathetically said to the president, "There's something personal that’s affecting you. Your son, while there's no ties to you, could be charged by your Department of Justice. How would that impact your presidency?" Biden responded by saying Hunter had done "nothing wrong" and that he was "proud of him."
President Biden has not faced a single question about his embattled son Hunter in a formal one-on-one interview setting since May 2023. (AP Photo/Patrick Semansky)
The president's limited access goes beyond interviews. According to data from UC Santa Barbara's American Presidency Project, Biden has held fewer press conferences than any modern president, averaging 11 per year so far, roughly half of Trump's 22 average and Obama's 20. When he does hold a solo press conference, he calls from a list of reporters pre-selected by his staff, rarely taking questions from anyone else. And during joint press conferences with other world leaders, Biden only calls on two pre-selected American reporters, in addition to two foreign reporters who are also able to ask both leaders questions.
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There certainly isn't a shortage of topics that journalists can press Biden on, such as the migrant criss at the southern border, the heightened tensions in the Middle East, the controversy surrounding Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin, his son Hunter's legal drama, the looming Robert Hur report, and his latest round of gaffes that are fueling concerns about his age as he seeks reelection.
White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre defended the president on Tuesday when asked about the Super Bowl dodge, citing his routine exchanges with reporters and adding, "I wouldn't say that he is not engaging with the press. I would not say that because he does."