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Biden Targets China During State of Union Speech

BEIJING — U.S. President Joe Biden on Thursday criticized China’s “unfair economic practices” and insisted he has done a better job standing up to Beijing than did former President Donald Trump, his rival in this year’s presidential election.

In his State of the Union address, Biden also touted other aspects of his China policy, including “standing up for peace and stability in the Taiwan Straits” and revitalizing “our partnerships and alliances in the Pacific.”

“I’ve made sure that the most advanced American technologies can’t be used in China … frankly for all his tough talk on China, it never occurred to my predecessor to do any of that,” Biden added.

Biden’s China comments, which made up only a brief part of his nationally televised speech, come a day after Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi escalated his country’s verbal attacks on the United States.

On the sidelines of an annual meeting of China’s National People’s Congress, Wang accused the United States of trying to contain China through sanctions, and insisted that Washington has “wrong perceptions” about Beijing.

“The means to suppress China are constantly updated, the list of unilateral sanctions is constantly extended, and the desire to inflict punishment on China has reached an unimaginable level,” said Wang during what appeared to be a tightly scripted interaction with local and foreign media.

Wang’s comments were a contrast from September, when Biden met Chinese President Xi Jinping in California. At that meeting, both sides agreed to restart dialogue and cooperate on several initiatives, including to counter the flow of fentanyl, a highly addictive synthetic opioid, into the United States.

While Wang acknowledged that “some progress” was made at what he called the “historic meeting,” he accused the United States of breaking some of its promises.

“If the United States always says one thing and does another, where will its credibility be as a major country? If the United States is nervous and anxious whenever it hears the word ‘China,’ where is the self-confidence of a major country?” Wang said.

Even as high-level talks resumed, the United States has expanded sanctions against China on a range of issues, from human rights abuses to its relations with Russia. U.S.-China ties are also strained over a wide range of other issues, including China’s behavior in disputed areas of the South China Sea, its military intimidation of Taiwan, and a growing U.S.-China technological competition.

Political cudgel

In his speech Thursday, Biden reiterated that he wants “competition with China, but not conflict,” while noting that the United States is “in a stronger position to win the competition for the 21st century against China or anyone else for that matter.”

“For years, I’ve heard many of my Republican and Democratic friends say that China is on the rise and America is falling behind. They’ve got it backwards … America is rising,” Biden said.

“We have the best economy in the world. And since I’ve come to office, our GDP is up. Our trade deficit with China is down to the lowest point in over a decade,” he added.

China is expected to get more public attention as the U.S. presidential election campaign intensifies. On Thursday, both Biden, a Democrat, and U.S. Senator Katie Britt, who delivered the Republican response, used China to attack their political opponents.

“The Chinese Communist Party is undercutting America’s workers. China is buying up our farmland, spying on our military installations, and spreading propaganda through the likes of TikTok,” Britt said, referring to the popular video-sharing social media app owned by a Chinese company.

“The CCP knows that if it conquers the minds of our next generation, it conquers America,” Britt said. “And what does President Biden do? He bans TikTok for government employees, but creates an account for his own campaign.”

U.S. lawmakers are making a renewed push to pass legislation that would effectively force Beijing-based ByteDance to sell TikTok within six months or face a U.S. ban. Some U.S. lawmakers warn ByteDance could pass private information about U.S. users to China’s Communist Party – an allegation rejected by the company’s CEO. Previous attempts to ban TikTok have been unsuccessful.

But despite recent developments, U.S.-China relations remain more stable than in past years, said Wang Huiyao, the founder and president of the Beijing-based Center for China and Globalization.

“We don’t want to see a downward spiral like we used to have. Because if that happens, that could be very dangerous for not only the U.S. and China, but for the world,” Wang told VOA during an interview at his office.

“I’m still cautiously optimistic,” Wang said. “Because people realize that [after] the last six, seven years, if the U.S. and China really get into a very ugly situation, then the whole world is finished.”
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Judge Denies Trump Relief From $83.3 Million Defamation Judgment

NEW YORK — The federal judge who oversaw a New York defamation trial that resulted in an $83.3 million award to a longtime magazine columnist from Donald Trump refused Thursday to relieve the ex-president from the verdict’s financial pinch.

Judge Lewis A. Kaplan told Trump’s attorney in a written order that he won’t delay deadlines for posting a bond that would ensure 80-year-old writer E. Jean Carroll can be paid the award if the judgment survives appeals.

The judge said any financial harm to the Republican front-runner for the presidency results from his slow response to the late-January verdict in the defamation case resulting from statements Trump made about Carroll while he was president in 2019 after she revealed her claims that he raped her in her memoir.

At the time, Trump accused her of making up claims that he raped her in the dressing room of a luxury Manhattan department store in spring 1996. A jury last May at a trial Trump did not attend awarded Carroll $5 million in damages, finding that Trump sexually abused her but did not rape her as rape was defined under New York state law. It also concluded that he defamed her in statements in October 2022.

Trump attended the January trial and briefly testified, though his remarks were severely limited by the judge, who had ruled that the jury had to accept the May verdict and was only to decide how much in damages, if any, Carroll was owed for Trump’s 2019 statements. In the statements, Trump claimed he didn’t know Carroll and accused her of making up lies to sell books and harm him politically.

Trump’s lawyers have challenged the judgment, which included a $65 million punitive award, saying there was a “strong probability” it will be reduced or eliminated on appeal.

In his order Thursday, Kaplan noted that Trump’s lawyers waited 25 days to seek to delay when a bond must be posted. The judgment becomes final Monday.

“Mr. Trump’s current situation is a result of his own dilatory actions,” Kaplan wrote.

Kaplan said the expense of ongoing litigation does not constitute irreparable injury.

Trump’s attorney, Alina Habba, did not immediately comment.

Since the January verdict, a state court judge in New York in a separate case has ordered Trump and his companies to pay $355 million in penalties for a yearslong scheme to dupe banks and others with financial statements that inflated his wealth. With interest, he owes the state nearly $454 million.
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Transcript of the Republican Response to the State of the Union Address

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Biden, Trump Take Aim at Each Other in Dueling Attacks

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Trump Wins Missouri’s Republican Caucuses; Haley Still Seeks Win

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With Back-to-Back Actions, Biden Spotlights China Data Security Threat

WASHINGTON — The Biden administration launched a series of actions against China in recent days, sustaining pressure against the United States’ key strategic rival even as it focuses on more urgent fronts, including the wars in Gaza and Ukraine.

In the span of one week, the administration announced an executive order to protect Americans’ personal data from foreign adversaries, including China; launched an investigation into potential security threats posed by connected vehicles that use Chinese technology; and placed sanctions on Chinese entities for supporting Moscow’s invasion of Ukraine.

The actions taken by President Joe Biden stand in contrast to the months of warming ties following a November summit in California between him and his Chinese counterpart, Xi Jinping — a meeting aimed to improve a bilateral relationship that had reached its lowest point in decades due to rivalry and mistrust.

Since the summit, diplomatic engagement has increased from both sides, including the resumption of military-to-military talks that were frozen after former U.S. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s 2022 visit to Taiwan.

Restarting staff-level talks in early January was key to ensuring that the two sides avoided a major cross-strait incident during Taiwan’s election later in the month.

In January, Washington and Beijing also launched a working group designed to crack down on the flow of Chinese precursors used in the production of fentanyl and other synthetic drugs sold in the U.S., another sign of cooperation between the superpowers.

Ties improved to the point that Beijing marked the 45th anniversary of U.S.-China diplomatic relations in January with a lavish banquet, where Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi promised that Chinese giant pandas, much loved by American zoo visitors, will return to U.S. by the end of the year.

So why the flurry of actions against China now?

National security issue

The White House sidestepped questions on the back-to-back timing of the measures.

Biden is “concerned about countries like China,” White House deputy press secretary Olivia Dalton said to reporters aboard Air Force One on Thursday.

“China is right now looking to flood the market here in the United States and around the world with vehicles equipped with advanced technology from countries of concern,” she said. “That’s a national security issue that we take very seriously.”

An administration official told reporters during a briefing that the U.S. Commerce Department probe launched Thursday to ensure that Chinese cars driving on American roads do not undermine U.S. national security, is “complementary and distinct” from the executive order to protect Americans’ personal data from China and other foreign adversaries. The latter order blocks bulk transfers of data such as geolocation, biometric, health and financial information to “countries of concern.”

By putting the two announcements next to each other, the administration is trying to communicate that they’re taking data security seriously, said Emily Benson, director of the Project on Trade and Technology at the Center for Strategic and International Studies.

“The anticipated outcome there was to signal that the connected vehicle rules are actually a national security instrument,” Benson told VOA.

The U.S. plans to engage partners and allies following the investigation into the threat posed by Chinese vehicles. There’s a “growing sense of the security risks” and “really strong interest in the measures that we might take and the results of the investigation,” an administration official told VOA during a briefing Wednesday.

Biden himself warned of the dangers.

“Connected vehicles from China could collect sensitive data about our citizens and our infrastructure and send this data back to the People’s Republic of China,” the president said in a statement.

National security concerns aside, the administration is also anticipating an overcapacity of more affordable Chinese vehicles entering the American marketplace, especially as Chinese auto producers such as BYD set up manufacturing facilities in Mexico that would afford them more favorable tariff rates under USMCA, the free-trade agreement between the U.S., Mexico and Canada.

“That has created a lot of fear in Washington about the longevity of the U.S. automobile sector,” Benson said.

She added that the executive actions taken this week are “easier and more appropriate” than the effort to ban TikTok. The social media app is used by more than 100 million Americans despite allegations that its China-based parent company, ByteDance, could collect sensitive user data.

While the federal government and dozens of individual states have barred TikTok from government devices, Congress has yet to enact legislation to ban Americans from using the application on their personal devices.

The app is highly popular, especially among young people, prompting Biden’s campaign to join the platform despite the administration’s previously firm stance on its potential national security concerns.

Balanced approach

As Biden gears up for his reelection campaign, his administration is keen to project the image that they are taking the threat of China seriously, said Yun Sun, director of the China Program at the Stimson Center.

“Balancing has always been the theme of his policy,” Sun told VOA. “When there is positive engagement, there’s also the punitive gestures.”

Without such gestures, the administration would be vulnerable to criticism that it is ignoring the fact that Beijing remains a source of significant national security challenges for the United States, she said.

“The administration has to demonstrate that it is extremely clear-eyed about the limitation of engagement but also the desirability of the engagement,” she said. “Engagement does not mean there’s no problem.”

Washington also announced sanctions against Chinese firms last week as part of a measure marking the second anniversary of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. The trade penalties targeted entities in Russia and in countries viewed by the administration as supporting Moscow’s war effort.

The actions against China followed a meeting between Wang and U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken at the sidelines of the Munich Security Conference earlier in February.

In the meeting, Wang warned Blinken that turning de-risking “into ‘de-China,’ building ‘small courtyards and high walls,’ and engaging in ‘decoupling from China’ will eventually backfire on the United States.”
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Artificial Intelligence Is Game Changer for Election Interference, FBI Warns

WASHINGTON — U.S. security officials are bracing for an onslaught of fast-paced influence operations, from a wide range of adversaries, aimed at impacting the country’s coming presidential election.

FBI Director Christopher Wray issued the latest warning about attempts to meddle with American voters as they decide whom to support when they go to the polls come November, telling a meeting of security professional Thursday that technologies such as artificial intelligence are already altering the threat landscape.

“This election cycle, the U.S. will face more adversaries moving at a faster pace and enabled by new technology,” Wray said.

“Advances in generative AI [artificial intelligence], for instance, are lowering the barrier to entry, making it easier for both more and less sophisticated foreign adversaries to engage in malign influence while making foreign influence efforts by players both old and new, more realistic and more difficult to detect,” he said.

The warning echoes concerns raised earlier in the week by a top lawmaker and by the White House, both singling out Russia.

“I worry that we are less prepared for foreign intervention in our elections in 2024 than we were in 2020,” said Mark Warner, the chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee, during a cybersecurity conference on Tuesday.

On Sunday, White House national security adviser Jake Sullivan told NBC’s “Meet the Press” there is “plenty of reason to be concerned.”

“There is a history here in presidential elections by the Russian Federation, by its intelligence services,” Sullivan said.

U.S. intelligence agencies concluded Russia sought to interfere in both the 2016 and 2020 elections.

But Russia has not been alone.

A declassified intelligence assessment looking at the 2022 midterm elections concluded with high to moderate confidence that Russia was joined by China and Iran in seeking to sway the outcome.

“China tacitly approved efforts to try to influence a handful of midterm races involving members of both U.S. political parties,” the report said.

“Tehran relied primarily on its intelligence services and Iran-based online influencers to conduct its covert operations,” it said. “Iran’s influence activities reflected its intent to exploit perceived social divisions and undermine confidence in U.S. democratic institutions during this election cycle.”

The United States has also alleged other adversaries, such as Cuba, Venezuela and Lebanese Hezbollah, have sought to influence elections, as have allies, such as Turkey and Saudi Arabia.

The warnings from Wray and others are encountering pushback from some lawmakers and conservative commentators who view such statements as an attempt to resurrect what they call the “Russia hoax” — saying the narrative that Russia interfered in the 2016 U.S. presidential election to help former President Donald Trump win is without merit.

Warner, however, dismissed that view in response to a question from VOA on the sidelines of Tuesday’s security conference. “Anyone who doesn’t think the Russian intel services have and will continue to interfere in our elections … I wonder where they’re getting their information to start with,” he said.

Wray on Thursday suggested the list of countries and other foreign groups seeking to influence U.S. voters is set to expand. “AI is most useful for what I would call kind of mediocre bad guys and making them kind of like intermediate,” he said.

“The really sophisticated adversaries are using AI more just to increase the speed and scale of their efforts,” he said. “But we are coming towards a day very soon where what I would call the experts, the most sophisticated adversaries, are going to find ways to use AI to be even more elite.”

Some private cybersecurity firms also see the danger growing.

This past September, Microsoft warned that Beijing has developed a new artificial intelligence capability that can produce “eye-catching content” more likely to go viral compared to previous Chinese influence operations.

Others agree.

“Whether it’s robocalls, whether it’s fake videos — all those things really even back to 2022, weren’t as prevalent,” Trellix CEO Bryan Palma told VOA. “You weren’t going to get any high-quality type of deepfake video.

“I think you’re going to see more and more of that as we get closer to the election,” he said.
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US Supreme Court Will Hear Trump Case for Immunity

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Biden Deemed ‘Healthy, Active, Robust’ During Annual Physical Exam

washington — U.S. President Joe Biden’s is a “healthy, active, robust 81-year-old male who remains fit to successfully execute the duties of the presidency,” his physician, Dr. Kevin O’Connor, said in a statement released by the White House on Wednesday, following Biden’s annual physical examination. 

“The president feels well, and this year’s physical identified no new concerns. He continues to be fit for duty and fully executes all of his responsibilities without any exemptions or accommodations,” O’Connor said following Biden’s visit to Walter Reed National Military Medical Center in Bethesda, Maryland, earlier Wednesday.  

The checkup included consultations with optometry, dentistry, orthopedics, physical therapy, neurology, sleep medicine, cardiology, radiology and dermatology specialists, O’Connor said.  

It’s Biden’s third physical since taking office, amid concerns about his age as he seeks a second term.  

“They think I look too young,” Biden joked to reporters at the White House after his checkup. “There is nothing different than last year,” he said.

According to the summary, Biden is currently being treated for several conditions, including obstructive sleep apnea, gastroesophageal reflux, seasonal allergies, arthritis and sensory peripheral neuropathy of the feet. He also has atrial fibrillation with normal ventricular response, a type of asymptomatic irregularity of the heartbeat.  

His doctor pronounced his conditions as “stable and well-controlled,” with “three common prescription medications and three common over-the-counter medications.”  

The symptoms were similar to those described in Biden’s 2023 physical exam report that noted the president’s “stiff gait,” due to “a combination of significant spinal arthritis, mild post-fracture foot arthritis and a mild sensory peripheral neuropathy of the feet,” and “occasional symptoms of gastroesophageal reflux,” that made him have to clear his throat often.     

President didn’t undergo cognitive test 

Recent events have highlighted Biden’s potential age-related issues, including the president being described in a special counsel report as an “elderly man with a poor memory.”      

In pushing back on reporters’ questions about his age, Biden insisted that his “memory is fine” but shortly after mistakenly referred to Egyptian President Abdel Fattah el-Sissi as the president of Mexico. That and two other mistaken references to world leaders’ names in recent weeks fueled further attacks by his rivals.     

Responding to reporters’ questions during her briefing on Wednesday, White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre said Biden did not undergo a cognitive test as part of his physical because the president’s physician, “doesn’t believe that he needs one.” 

As president, Biden passes a cognitive test “every day,” Jean-Pierre underscored. 

A poll by the George Washington University shows 35% of respondents say Biden was in good enough physical health to serve effectively as president, and 38% said he has the mental soundness to serve effectively as president.  

This is lower that what respondents say about the leading candidate for the Republican presidential nomination, Donald Trump, who is four years younger. For Trump, the numbers are 54% and 46%, respectively. 

“These figures indicate that this is a big problem for Biden,” Todd Belt, professor of politics at George Washington University, told VOA. “The campaign has changed course to attack Trump on his vulnerabilities on the mental soundness issue.” 

Biden did exactly that during an appearance on a late-night television show earlier this week, by referencing a video in which Trump appeared to forget his wife’s name.  

Americans concerned about Biden’s age

Trump was 70 when he took office in 2017, which made him the oldest American president to be inaugurated until Biden broke his record at 78 in 2021. The former president has also made blunders, including praising Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban for his leadership of Turkey, and confusing his Republican rival, Nikki Haley, with former U.S. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi.   

A February ABC News/Ipsos poll conducted after the release of the special counsel report indicated concerns among 59% of Americans regarding the age and capability for a second term for both candidates, although more Americans are worried about Biden compared with Trump, said Clifford Young, president of Ipsos Public Affairs.   

“Age is an Achilles’ heel, is an anchor for Biden,” Young told VOA. “It was four years ago. Without a doubt, it will be this year.”   

Though not publicly announced in advance, the timing of Biden’s physical was anticipated, given the increasing focus on his age and health in the context of his reelection campaign ahead of the November election. 
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US Senate Republicans Block Democrats’ Bill Assuring Right to IVF

WASHINGTON — Democrats on Wednesday failed in an attempt to rush legislation through the U.S. Senate guaranteeing Americans’ access to in vitro fertilization and other assisted reproductive technologies, after an Alabama court designated frozen embryos as children.

The state Supreme Court ruling on February 16 that frozen embryos should be considered children prompted at least three Alabama providers to halt the IVF procedure that involves combining eggs and sperm in a laboratory dish for couples having difficulty conceiving.

Alabama’s court ruling has raised concerns that those involved in IVF could face prosecution because embryos that are found to be nonviable are sometimes disposed of or used for research, and that it could encourage other states to follow suit.

Democratic Senator Tammy Duckworth, an Iraq War veteran who suffered grave injuries in combat in 2004, sought an immediate vote by the Senate on Wednesday on passage of her “Access to Family Building Act” legislation.

Her move for a vote, which required the consent of all 100 senators, was promptly blocked by Republican Senator Cindy Hyde-Smith.

“The bill before us today is a vast overreach that is full of poison pills that goes way too far, far beyond ensuring legal access to IVF,” Hyde-Smith said.

Duckworth countered that her bill simply would guarantee access to IVF treatments and facilities “without fear of being prosecuted,” while also shielding IVF providers and health insurance companies.

While many Republican officeholders have expressed discomfort with the Alabama court ruling, the party was not ready to fall in line with Democrats on this hot-button issue that is linked to the national debate over women’s right to abortion.

Duckworth told reporters on Tuesday that she struggled for a decade with infertility following her military service in Iraq, which prompted her and her husband to turn to IVF. They now have two children.

“I have five embryos that were created (using IVF); three that were deemed to be nonviable, would not survive,” Duckworth said.

She said that at the time, in 2013, her doctor told her that if “personhood laws” regarding embryos were to be enacted, “I could be convicted of manslaughter or murder for discarding these three eggs that were nonviable.”

Reproductive rights are expected to be a major issue in this year’s presidential and congressional campaigns, with Democrats lashing out at both the U.S. Supreme Court’s 2022 ruling overturning its landmark Roe v. Wade case establishing a national right to abortion, as well as subsequent state reproductive rights actions such as the one on IVF.

In a statement Wednesday, White House spokesperson Karine Jean-Pierre said the Republican blocking of Duckworth’s measure was “outrageous.”

Jean-Pierre added that President Joe Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris “will continue to fight to protect access to reproductive health care, including IVF, and call on Congress to restore the protections of Roe v. Wade in federal law for all women in every state.”
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McConnell to Step Down as US Senate Republican Leader in November

WASHINGTON — U.S. Senate Republican leader Mitch McConnell’s said on Wednesday he would step down from his leadership role, leaving a power vacuum atop the party he has piloted for nearly 17 years, more than any other party leader in the chamber’s history. 

“I turned 82 last week. The end of my contributions are closer than I prefer,” McConnell said on the Senate floor, his voice breaking with emotion. “Father Time remains undefeated. I’m no longer the young man sitting in the back hoping colleagues remember my name. It’s time for the next generation of leadership.” 

The Kentucky lawmaker’s departure will remove a central character in negotiations with Democrats and the White House on spending deals to keep the federal government funded and avert a shutdown. 

It will also mark the step back of an orderly counterpart to the tumultuous approach of Donald Trump, the front-runner for the Republican presidential nomination, and the hardline House Freedom Caucus ahead of the November election for president, the full House of Representatives and a third of the Senate. 
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‘Uncommitted’ Michigan Voters Send Signal to Biden on Gaza Cease-fire

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Biden to Republican Lawmakers: Consequences of Not Passing Ukraine Aid ‘Dire’

The $95 billion foreign aid package approved by the U.S. Senate this month remains stalled in the Republican-majority House of Representatives, jeopardizing the delivery of $60 billion in aid to Ukraine to help it defeat Russia. Congressional leaders met with U.S. President Joe Biden on Tuesday to discuss the impasse. VOA’s Congressional Correspondent Katherine Gypson has more.
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In Border Visits, Biden and Trump Will Focus On Different Priorities

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US Election Officials Prioritize Security Ahead of November Vote

U.S. election authorities say they are confident they will be able to fend off security threats to the November presidential vote. In Alexandria, Virginia, VOA’s Veronica Balderas Iglesias sat in on a training for election officers, one of several measures to ensure a fair and transparent vote.
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Republican Trying to Block Party From Paying Trump’s Legal Bills

COLUMBIA, S.C. — At least one member of the Republican National Committee is working to slow Donald Trump’s attempted takeover of the organization by pushing to keep the committee neutral until Trump is officially the presidential nominee and avoid picking up his legal bills.

Two draft resolutions are being circulated by Henry Barbour, a national committeeman from Mississippi, for consideration at the RNC’s upcoming March meeting in Houston. Barbour said support for the resolutions among RNC members is growing but he does not yet have the needed co-sponsors, and any resolutions would ultimately be nonbinding.

The effort comes after Trump last week publicly called to replace the RNC’s current leaders and install one of his senior campaign advisers and his daughter-in-law Lara Trump in top roles. Lara Trump suggested earlier in the week that GOP voters would support the committee paying her father-in-law’s legal bills as he faces a raft of criminal and civil indictments.

Trump senior campaign adviser Chris LaCivita, whom the former president wants to install as the party’s chief operating officer, told reporters Friday night that the RNC would not pay Trump’s legal bills.

In a statement on Saturday, LaCavita said “the primary is over and it is the RNC’s sole responsibility to defeat Joe Biden and win back the White House.”

“Efforts to delay that assist Joe Biden in the destruction of our nation,” he said. “Republicans cannot stand on the sidelines and allow this to happen.”

One of Barbour’s proposed resolutions says that the RNC and its leadership will stay neutral throughout the presidential primary and not take on additional staff from any of the active campaigns until a candidate has the needed delegates to be the nominee.

The second resolution says the organization will not pay the legal bills of any candidate for federal or state office but will instead focus its spending on efforts directly related to the 2024 election.

“The RNC has one job. That’s winning elections,” Barbour said. “I believe RNC funds should be spent solely on winning elections, on political expenses, not legal bills.”

The RNC was paying some of Trump’s legal bills for New York cases that started while he was president, The Washington Post reported. But current RNC Chairperson Ronna McDaniel said in November 2022 that the RNC would stop p

aying once Trump became a candidate again and started running for the 2024 presidential election.

Trump is spending millions on lawyers in civil cases and four criminal cases, but he also has legal debts that top half a billion dollars.

Former U.N. Ambassador Nikki Haley, who is Trump’s last major challenger in the GOP primary, said a family member or campaign manager should not be leading the RNC.

“I would hope that the people in the RNC know that they have a responsibility, a responsibility to put in people in the RNC who are going to look out in the best interest of all of the Republican Party, not just one person,” Haley said.

The resolutions were first reported by The Dispatch on Saturday. 
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Former President Trump Beats Former UN Ambassador Haley in Her State

Former US President Donald Trump won the Republican Presidential Primary in the Southern state of South Carolina on Saturday, defeating former US Ambassador to the United Nations Nikki Haley in her home state. But Haley vowed to continue her campaign through Super Tuesday in early March, when a block of US states will have their say in who runs against President Joe Biden in November. VOA’s Congressional Correspondent Katherine Gypson has more.
Camera: Henry Hernandez and Ostap Yarysh
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Trump Wins South Carolina Primary; Haley Heads to Michigan

charleston, south carolina — Former U.S. President Donald Trump won South Carolina’s Republican primary on Saturday, beating former United Nations Ambassador Nikki Haley in her home state and further consolidating his path to a third straight GOP nomination. 

Trump has now swept every contest that counted for Republican delegates, with wins in Iowa, New Hampshire, Nevada and the U.S. Virgin Islands. The former president’s latest victory will likely increase pressure on Haley, who was Trump’s representative to the U.N. and South Carolina governor from 2011 to 2017, to leave the race. 

Haley has vowed to stay in the race through at least the primaries on March 5, known as Super Tuesday, but was unable to dent Trump’s momentum in her home state despite holding far more campaign events and arguing that the indictments against Trump will hamstring him against U.S. President Joe Biden in the fall. 

South Carolina’s first-in-the-South primary has historically been a reliable bellwether for Republicans. In all but one primary since 1980, the Republican winner in South Carolina has gone on to be the party’s nominee. The lone exception was Newt Gingrich in 2012. 

Haley said in recent days that she would head straight to Michigan for its Tuesday primary, the last major contest before Super Tuesday. She faces questions about where she might be able to win a contest or be competitive. 

Trump and Biden are already behaving like they expect to face off in November. 

Trump and his allies argue Biden has made the U.S. weaker and point to the chaotic withdrawal from Afghanistan and Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. Trump has also repeatedly attacked Biden over high inflation earlier in the president’s term and his handling of record-high migrant crossings at the U.S.-Mexico border. 

Trump has questioned — often in harshly personal terms — whether the 81-year-old Biden is too old to serve a second term. Biden’s team in turn has highlighted the 77-year-old Trump’s own flubs on the campaign trail. 

Biden has stepped up his recent fundraising trips around the country and increasingly attacked Trump directly. He’s called Trump and his “Make America Great Again” movement dire threats to the nation’s founding principles, and the president’s reelection campaign has lately focused most of its attention on Trump, suggesting he’d use the first day of a second presidency as a dictator and that he’d tell Russia to attack NATO allies who fail to keep up with defense spending obligations mandated by the alliance. 

Haley also criticized Trump on his NATO comments and also for questioning why her husband wasn’t on the campaign trail with her — even as former first lady Melania Trump hasn’t appeared with him. Major Michael Haley is deployed in the Horn of Africa on a mission with the South Carolina Army National Guard. 

But South Carolina’s Republican voters line up with Trump on having lukewarm feelings about NATO and continued U.S. support for Ukraine, according to AP VoteCast data from Saturday’s primary. About 6 in 10 oppose continuing aid to Ukraine in its fight against Russia. Only about a third described America’s participation in NATO as “very good,” with more saying it’s only “somewhat good.” 

Haley has raised copious amounts of campaign money and is scheduled to begin a cross-country campaign swing on Sunday in Michigan ahead of Super Tuesday on March 5, when many delegate-rich states hold primaries. 

South Carolina Senator Lindsey Graham complimented Haley while speaking to reporters at Trump’s election night party in Columbia but suggested it was time for her to drop out. 

“I think the sooner she does, the better for her, the better for the party,” Graham said. 

Biden won South Carolina’s Democratic primary earlier this month and faces only one remaining challenger, Dean Phillips. The Minnesota Democratic congressman has continued to campaign in Michigan ahead of the Democratic primary there, despite having little chance of actually beating Biden. 

Though Biden is expected to cruise to his party’s renomination, he faces criticism from some Democrats for providing military backing to Israel in its war against Hamas in the Gaza Strip. The war could hurt the president’s general election chances in swing states such as  Michigan, which is home to a large Arab American population. 
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Trump Enters South Carolina’s Republican Primary Looking to Embarrass Haley

CHARLESTON, SOUTH CAROLINA — Former U.S. President Donald Trump is looking to win his fourth straight state primary Saturday over Nikki Haley in South Carolina, aiming to hand a home-state embarrassment to his last remaining major rival for the Republican nomination.

Trump went into the primary with a huge polling lead and the backing of the state’s top Republicans, including U.S. Senator Tim Scott, a former rival in the race. Haley, who served as United Nations ambassador under Trump, has spent weeks crisscrossing the state that twice elected her governor warning that the dominant front-runner, who is 77 and faces four indictments, is too old and distracted to be president again.

In all but one primary since 1980, the Republican winner in South Carolina has gone on to be the party’s nominee. But Haley has repeatedly vowed to carry on if she loses her home state, even as Trump positions himself for a likely general election rematch against President Joe Biden.

Trump’s backers, including those who previously supported Haley during her time as governor, seemed confident that the former president would have a solid victory Saturday.

“I did support her when she was governor. She’s done some good things,” Davis Paul, 36, said as he waited for Trump at a recent rally in Conway. “But I just don’t think she’s ready to tackle a candidate like Trump. I don’t think many people can.”

Trump has swept into the state for a handful of large rallies in-between fundraisers and events in other states, including Michigan, which holds its GOP primary Tuesday.

He has drawn much larger crowds and campaigned with Gov. Henry McMaster, who succeeded Haley, and Scott, who was elevated to the Senate by Haley.

Speaking Friday in Rock Hill, Trump accused Haley of staying in the race to hurt him at the behest of Democratic donors.

“All she’s trying to do is inflict pain on us so they can win in November,” he said. “We’re not going to let that happen.”

In some of those rallies, Trump has made comments that handed Haley more fodder for her stump speeches, such as his Feb. 10 questioning of why her husband — currently on a South Carolina Army National Guard deployment to Africa — hadn’t been campaigning alongside her. Haley turned that point into an argument that the front-runner doesn’t respect servicemembers and their families, long a criticism that has followed Trump going back to his suggesting the late Sen. John McCain, a prisoner of war in Vietnam, wasn’t a hero because he was captured.

That same night, Trump asserted that he would encourage countries like Russia “to do whatever the hell they want” against NATO member countries who failed to meet the transatlantic alliance’s defense spending targets. Haley has been holding out that moment as evidence that Trump is too volatile and “getting weak in the knees when it comes to Russia.”

After one of Haley’s events, Terry Sullivan, a U.S. Navy veteran who lives in Hopkins, said he had planned to support Trump but changed his mind after hearing Haley’s critique of his NATO comments.

“One country can say whatever it wants, but when you have an agreement, among other nations, we should join the agreements of other nations, not just off on our own,” Sullivan said. “After listening to Nikki, I think I’m a Nikki supporter now.”

Haley has made an indirect appeal to Democrats who in large numbers sat out their own presidential primary earlier this month, adding into her stump speech a line that “anybody can vote in this primary as long as they didn’t vote in the February 3 Democrat primary.”

Some of those voters have been showing up at her events, saying that although they planned to vote for Biden in the general election, they planned to cross over to the GOP primary Saturday to oppose Trump now.

In any other campaign cycle, a home state loss might be detrimental to a campaign. In 2016, Sen. Marco Rubio dropped out shortly after losing Florida in a blowout to Trump, after his campaign argued the political winds would shift in his favor once the campaign moved to his home state.

And Haley’s campaign can’t name a state in which they feel she will be victorious over Trump.

But in a speech this week in Greenville, Haley said she would stay in the campaign “until the last person votes,” arguing that those whose contests come after the early primaries and caucuses deserved the right to have a choice between candidates.

Haley also used that speech — which many had assumed was an announcement she was shuttering her campaign — to argue that she feels “no need to kiss the ring,” as others had, possibly with prospects of serving as Trump’s running mate in mind.

“I have no fear of Trump’s retribution,” Haley reiterated. “I’m not looking for anything from him. My own political future is of zero concern.”
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Haley Seeks Key Win in Home State Against Front-Runner Trump

Georgetown, South Carolina — The two-person contest for the 2024 Republican presidential nomination comes to South Carolina on Saturday, where former governor and United Nations Ambassador Nikki Haley is looking for her home state to deliver her first win of the election season over former President Donald Trump.

Polling shows Trump holds a strong lead over Haley, after securing wins in the Iowa caucus and the New Hampshire primary in January. A Suffolk University/USA Today poll of South Carolina voters conducted last week found that 63% of the state’s voters prefer the former president.

Earlier this week, Haley vowed to continue on to Super Tuesday, the primary day in early March when a diverse set of 15 states will vote for their choice of a Republican candidate to go up against President Joe Biden in the November general election.

But at a campaign event Friday, Donald Trump Jr. told reporters Haley’s vow was a calculated decision.

“It’s just political theater, but it’s the political theater designed to hurt Donald Trump and the Republican chances in November. She’s saying that she’s going to remain until Super Tuesday. I’m sure she will. She won’t win any states on Super Tuesday either,” he said.

Trump holds 63 delegates going into Saturday’s vote, while Haley holds 17. A candidate needs 1215 delegates to secure the nomination, with most of the delegates still to be awarded.

Haley told voters at a Georgetown, South Carolina, rally on Thursday that she is the better choice in the general election, arguing American voters are concerned about the age and abilities of both Trump and Biden.

“Are we really saying the best we can do is two guys in their 80s?” Haley said. “Because we need someone who can serve eight years uninterrupted, day and night, and focus on what’s going to get solutions for the American people.”

Haley is Trump’s only remaining rival for the nomination. Some voters who chose Trump in the last election said they are turning to Haley now as an alternative to the former president’s rhetoric.

“Nikki Haley is a lot less volatile than he is — he has a very volatile personality,” Kat Loftus, a voter from Georgetown, told VOA. “I think she would do a much better job of listening to people that are different from her and negotiating and getting things accomplished to unite our country.”

Loftus said border security and immigration are her top concerns this election year and Haley’s experience as the U.S. ambassador to the United Nations would be useful as she negotiated with Mexico’s president on border security.

In her well-attended speech, Haley also argued Trump has harmed the global reputation of the United States with his support for Russian President Vladimir Putin.

“Donald Trump is siding with a thug,” Haley said. “Half a million people have been wounded or killed because Putin invaded Ukraine. Donald Trump is siding with a dictator who kills his political opponents.”

Tee Miller, a South Carolina voter, agreed, saying the former president had his chance during his term.

“Everyone thinks he’s going to bring this change, but he had the opportunity before and didn’t really make the change. And he’s also brought on new baggage,” Miller said.

Flo Phillips did change her mind. She voted for Trump in the last election but said she is now voting for Haley.

“I can be proud of her when she’s talking. She’s not saying horrible things about everybody. She seems to be a real smart person,” Phillips told VOA.

Trump campaign focused on Biden

But Haley was barely mentioned Friday by Trump Jr. as he rallied voters in Charleston, South Carolina.

“We can get our country back to where it needs to be,” Trump Jr. told a small group of voters, alleging Biden is controlled by radical Leftists. “No one actually thinks that Joe Biden is coming up with policy, right?”

Rosie, a South Carolina voter who declined to provide her last name, agreed, saying that Biden has torn down democratic values during his term in office. She said she did not consider voting for Haley.

“She was on record saying that she would never run if Trump was running. So that’s just indicative of her flip flopping on what she says she’s going to do and then what she does. She’s proven that her track record is, ‘I’ll say what I need to get elected and then do the opposite,'” she told VOA.

“Nikki is a good lady,” South Carolina voter Todd, who declined to provide his last name, said he appreciated her leadership in 2015 when a racist gunmen killed eight people at the Charleston AME church. Todd, who described himself as a big fan of Trump Jr.’s political podcasts, said the timing of Haley candidacy wasn’t right. “With all that’s going on in our country, it’s just not the right time.”

Carolyn Corcoran, a voter and single mother worried about the rising cost of living, said Haley is too politically entrenched in Washington. She said she likes Trump because he puts people ahead of politics.

“The way they’re attacking Trump by using the law as a political weapon — it’s really heartbreaking for someone who protected people for years and enforced the laws the way they should be enforced,” said Corcoran, who retired from law enforcement after 30 years.

“To see our whole country, the attorneys general using the law to try to get at Trump, when he’s never done anything that anyone else hasn’t done. They just want to weaponize the law against him.”  
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Former President Trump Leading Only Republican Opponent in Her Home State

The two-person contest for the 2024 Republican presidential nomination comes this weekend to South Carolina, where former United Nations Ambassador Nikki Haley hopes for an upset victory in her home state over former president Donald Trump. VOA’s Congressional Correspondent Katherine Gypson has more from the Southern state.
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Why Are Americans Likely Stuck With a Biden-Trump Rematch in November?

washington — In an election year beset with uncertainties, one thing is clear: Americans find a November rematch between U.S. President Joe Biden and his leading Republican challenger, former U.S. President Donald Trump, even less appealing than the first time around in 2020.

A January Reuters/Ipsos poll showed most Americans do not want Biden and Trump to run again and that they are tired of seeing the same candidates in presidential elections.

Trump is besieged by legal woes, and both he and Biden are seen as too old, although polls show more Americans worry about Biden, who would be 81 on Election Day, than Trump, who would be 78.

So, why are Americans in this predicament?

The short answer, according to analysts, is that both Biden and Trump want another term, and they operate in a political system geared to favor incumbents.

Trump wants four more years

A second term could deliver vindication for Trump who since losing to Biden in 2020 has pushed baseless claims that the election was stolen, said Thomas Schwartz, a presidential historian with Vanderbilt University.

Trump’s critics accuse him of running not for the good of the country but to stay out of prison, something he denies. Trump faces 91 criminal charges under four indictments: for falsifying his business records in New York, for withholding classified federal government documents in Florida, and for attempting to overturn the 2020 election in two separate cases in Washington and the state of Georgia.

These indictments have not hurt his poll numbers, said Clifford Young, president of Ipsos Public Affairs in the U.S.

“Trump has a very strong connection with his base,” Young told VOA. “It’s almost unbreakable.”

Revisiting grievances that resonate with MAGA (Make America Great Again) Republicans, Trump dominated the primaries — the statewide voting processes in which voters select a party’s nominee who will compete in the general election — held so far. He is expected to handily win the rest, capitalizing on a system that amplifies the most ideologically fervent voices of the electorate.

This is particularly true in states with “closed” primaries where voters must register with a party before voting. The process shuts out independent and unaffiliated voters, and candidates win by taking on the most ideologically extreme positions.

“You have an overwhelming vote for Donald Trump among Republican primary voters,” Schwartz told VOA.

But even “open” primaries, where registered voters regardless of their political affiliation can vote for any candidate, reflect only a small share of the electorate. In U.S. elections since 2000, the average turnout rate for primary elections is 27% of registered voters, compared to 60.5% for general elections.

Biden wants four more years

Like any incumbent American president, Biden sees a second term as a vindication of his achievements, Schwartz said.

Biden secured a series of legislative wins, led the Western response to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, and presided over an economy where recession fears have eased, growth and job gains are beating expectations, and inflation is cooling.

“It is possible for Joe Biden to declare himself a successful one-term president and step aside. He just doesn’t want to,” Schwartz noted, citing Harry Truman and Lyndon Johnson who decided not to run again in March of 1952 and 1968 respectively. “And the party is not strong enough to tell him to do so.”

Democrats see Biden as the best barricade against their biggest fear — another Trump administration, Schwartz said. Had Trump not been in the race, he added, they would have been more willing to challenge Biden.

“What I’m hearing is, we’re riding with Biden,” said Democratic strategist Corryn Grace Freeman.

This despite progressives’ frustration with the president’s inability to fully cancel student loan debt and his response to the Israel-Hamas war, she told VOA.

“There are many people that cannot support this president, who also don’t like Donald Trump, who just feel like the Democratic Party consistently fails us,” she said, adding that support from Blacks and Latinos “is beginning to dwindle because of how this president has shown up.”

Democrats are now stuck in an extraordinarily high-risk gamble where a potential health or other age-related incident could further discourage voters, Schwartz warned. But despite Biden’s weak poll numbers and questions about his age, there is no Plan B for Democrats.

“No viable alternative got into the race,” said Elaine Kamarck, senior fellow in Governance Studies and the director of the Center for Effective Public Management at Brookings Institution. “You can’t beat something with nothing,” she told VOA.

This notion was put to the test early, during the January New Hampshire primary that Biden skipped because he had promised South Carolina Democrats that their state would host the first primary. The president was not on the New Hampshire primary ballot, but the majority of voters there wrote in his name, delivering his overwhelming victory over two longshot challengers, Minnesota Congressman Dean Phillips and self-help author Marianne Williamson, who were on the ballot.

System favors incumbents

Both essentially running as incumbents, Biden and Trump have huge influence over their party apparatus and resources. They also benefit from a primary system where a small number of states have outsized influence and candidate choices are locked in far in advance of the election, even if they become less popular.

The latter feature of the system is the unintended result of efforts to fix the former, said Geoffrey Cowan, a professor at the University of Southern California.

During the 1968 Democratic National Convention, Cowan pushed for reform to ensure voters in all 50 states are represented, replacing a system where fewer than 20 states held primary elections and caucuses and presidential nominees were mostly selected by party leaders during their convention.

“I put together this commission which said that all delegates to the 1972 convention would have to be picked through a process open to full public participation in the calendar year of the election,” Cowan told VOA.

In mandating that primaries are held the same year, the commission did not anticipate that state rules would evolve to lock in candidates early, even if voters’ attitudes about them change, Cowan said.

Most states now require candidates who want to run in a party’s primary to register by the first week of election year. States also race to hold their primaries as early as possible, a process known as frontloading.

This means by the third week of February, it would be difficult for a candidate to launch a campaign against Biden or Trump even though there are still more than 250 days to the election. Primaries have been held in critical states such as New Hampshire, Nevada, and South Carolina, and candidacy filing deadlines have passed in many others.

Which means, unless one of them drops out and the party scrambles to nominate a replacement during the convention, Americans are stuck with either Trump, who will be the Republican nominee by championing MAGA grievances, or Biden, because he is seen as the only one who can beat Trump.
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Former US President Jimmy Carter Surpasses One Year in Hospice Care

chicago, illinois — A year since The Carter Center announced that former U.S. President Jimmy Carter was receiving end-of-life hospice care, Carter continues to defy the odds.

He quietly celebrated his 99th birthday on October 1, and last appeared in public on November 29 to attend the funeral of his wife, Rosalynn Carter.

“He is very old and very frail,” said author Jonathan Alter, who chronicled Carter’s life in the book “His Very Best.” “When you are 99, various systems in your body start breaking down, but it’s very important to understand that he does not have any underlying health condition like heart failure or cancer.”

The Carter family’s decision to announce that the 39th president was entering hospice care has raised awareness about end-of-life care giving, which Alter compares to the decades-long efforts of the former president and first lady to remove the stigma associated with mental illness.

“They did this very intentionally to give a boost to the hospice movement,” Alter told VOA in a recent Skype interview. “I don’t think there was any expectation that he’d still be in hospice a year later, but they were very, very interested in spreading the word about hospice.”

“Once again leading by example, [the Carter family] is showing us how to embrace a stage of life that people don’t want to think about — that people don’t want to talk about,” Ben Marcantonio, interim CEO of the National Hospice and Palliative Care Organization, explained during an event his organization sponsored in New York’s Time Square in August, recorded live on Facebook.

“They’re showing us how hospice helps patients live life to the fullest to the end of life, and that’s why we’re gathered here today to publicly thank President Carter and his family.”

While now out of the spotlight, the global nonprofit Carter Center continues to “wage peace, fight disease and build hope” around the world. One of Jimmy Carter’s key efforts leading the center — the complete eradication of parasitic Guinea worm infections — marked a steady number of infections in the last several years.

“Thirteen human cases reported in 2023,” said Adam Weiss, director of The Carter Center’s Guinea worm eradication program. “With such few human cases, the biggest risk is about the reinfection of humans from some of the animal infections that are occurring primarily in Chad, Mali, Cameroon and Angola.”

“While nine of those 13 cases were in Chad, four of those nine cases were in one family,” explained Dr. Donald Hopkins, one of the architects of The Carter Center’s Guinea worm eradication efforts.

Hopkins encouraged Carter to take on the neglected tropical disease in the center’s early days and added that while the annual number of infections did not decrease this year, the total number of infections globally are dramatically different from where they were when the effort began in the 1980s.

“There were an estimated 3 ½ million cases, mostly in Africa, but some also in India, Pakistan and Yemen,” said Hopkins. “Having only 13 human cases now annually means that a lot fewer people are suffering.”

Middle East conflicts

In recent months, The Carter Center has called for a cease-fire in the war between Israel and Hamas, which threatens to undo a pillar of Jimmy Carter’s legacy. The genesis of the center’s efforts to promote peace and democracy around the world was the success of the Camp David Peace Accords, which Carter brokered between Egypt and Israel during his presidency in the 1970s.

“This treaty between Egypt and Israel is the most successful, durable treaty of the postwar era,” Alter told VOA.

The tense and difficult negotiations Carter hosted at the Camp David Presidential Retreat for 12 days in September 1978 between Egyptian President Anwar Sadat and Israeli Prime Minister Menachem Begin resulted in a treaty that ended decades of conflict between Israel and one of its most powerful neighbors.

“Israel turned back hundreds of thousands of acres of land in the Sinai Peninsula and pulled the Israeli settlements in the Sinai Peninsula as they turned that land back to Egypt. In exchange for that, they received a promise from Egypt it would not attack Israel as it had four times in the previous 30 years. It was understandable why it would be durable. It was a land for peace swap,” Alter said.

But as Israel presses its offensive against Hamas in the Gaza strip, the Egyptian government has threatened to suspend the 45-year-old treaty.

“Given the stakes, this is a big deal and obviously very much on the mind not only of the Israelis who understand its importance, but also the United States,” Alter said.

He said it also underscores Carter’s unrealized dream of broader peace in the Middle East.

“If Jimmy Carter were just a few years younger, you can bet he would be in the region right now trying to make peace,” Alter said.

While Carter holds the records for the longest-living occupant of the White House and the longest marriage of any president and first lady in U.S. history, he marks another first this year.

The White House Historical Association unveiled its annual Christmas ornament on Wednesday, this year featuring Carter — the first time a living president is honored with an ornament.

“Both the front and reverse side of the ornament feature peace doves, symbolic of President Carter’s work for peace in the Middle East, and perhaps most significantly, the Egypt-Israel Peace Treaty signed on the North Lawn of the White House on March 26, 1979,” the association describes on its website.

On the reverse side of the ornament is the Seawolf-class USS Jimmy Carter. Commissioned in 2005, it is the only submarine to be named for a living president. The globe at the center refers to Carter’s lifelong work on environmental conservation. At the base of the anchor is a garland of peanut flowers, a reminder of Carter’s years as a farmer and businessman in Plains, Georgia.
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Biden’s Team Challenges How President Is Portrayed in Press

NEW YORK — Occupants of the White House have grumbled over news coverage practically since the place was built. Now it’s U.S. President Joe Biden’s turn: With a reelection campaign underway, there are signs that those behind the president are starting to more aggressively and publicly challenge how he is portrayed. 

Within the past two weeks, an administration aide sent an unusual letter to the White House Correspondents’ Association complaining about coverage of a special counsel’s report on Biden’s handling of classified documents. In addition, the president’s campaign objected to its perception that negative stories about Biden’s age got more attention than remarks by Donald Trump about the NATO alliance. 

It’s not quite “enemy of the people” territory. But it is noticeable. 

“It is a strategy,” said Frank Sesno, a professor at George Washington University and former CNN Washington bureau chief. “It does several things at once. It makes the press a foil, which is a popular pattern for politicians of all stripes.” 

It can also distract voters from bad news. And while some newsrooms quickly dismiss the criticism, he says, others may pause and think twice about what they write. 

The letter from Ian Sams, spokesman for the White House counsel’s office, suggested that reporters improperly framed stories about the February 8 release of Special Counsel Robert Hur’s report. Sams pointed to stories by CBS News, The Wall Street Journal, The Associated Press and others emphasizing that Hur had found evidence that Biden willfully retained and disclosed classified material. Sams wrote that much of that so-called evidence didn’t hold up and was negated by Hur’s decision not to press charges. 

He said it was critical to address it when “significant errors” like misstating the findings and conclusions of a federal investigation of a president occur. 

It was Sams’ second foray into press criticism in a few months; last fall, he urged journalists to give more scrutiny to House Republicans and the reasons behind their impeachment inquiry of Biden. 

“Everybody makes mistakes, and nobody’s perfect,” Sams told the AP. “But a healthy back and forth over what’s the full story helps make both the press and the government sharper in how the country and world get the news they need to hear.” 

Kelly O’Donnell, president of the correspondents’ association and an NBC News correspondent, suggested Sams’ concerns were misdirected and should be addressed to individual news organizations. 

“It is inappropriate for the White House to utilize internal pool distribution channels, primarily for logistics and the rapid sharing of need-to-know information, to disseminate generalized critiques of news coverage,” O’Donnell said. 

In a separate statement, Biden campaign spokesman T.J. Ducklo criticized media outlets for time spent discussing the 81-year-old president’s age and mental capacity, an issue that was raised anew when Biden addressed the Hur report with reporters. He suggested that was less newsworthy and important than Trump’s NATO comments. 

Americans deserve a press corps that covers Trump “with the seriousness and ferocity this moment requires,” said Ducklo, who resigned from the White House in 2021 for threatening a reporter. 

To be fair, deadline times likely affected the initial disparity in coverage that Ducklo pointed out. And Trump’s remarks have hardly been ignored by media outlets. 

The criticism comes amid the backdrop of unhappiness among some journalists about how much Biden is made available for questions — an issue that surfaced again when Biden turned down an opportunity to appear before tens of millions of Americans in an interview during the Super Bowl pregame show. 

The 33 news conferences Biden has given during the first three years of his presidency is lower than any other American president in that time span since Ronald Reagan, said Martha Kumar, a Towson University professor emeritus and expert on presidents and the press. Similarly, the 86 interviews Biden has given is lower than any president since she began studying records with Reagan. By comparison, Barack Obama gave 422 interviews during his first three years. 

Instead, Biden prefers more informal appearances where reporters ask a few questions, with comparatively little opportunity for follow-up, she said: The 535 such sessions that Biden conducted was second only to Trump’s 572. 

One example followed Biden’s remarks Friday after the death of Russian dissident Alexey Navalny. Another was Biden’s early evening availability following the release of Hur’s report, a chaotic scene where reporters tried to outshout one another. The president’s performance, and remarks about his forgetfulness that were made in Hur’s report, led to more questions about the impact of age on his ability. 

“It did not serve him well,” Kumar said. Some on Biden’s team, meanwhile, believe the president showed a combativeness in the face of criticism that Americans will appreciate. 
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