During the White House press briefing a reporter asked of the cocaine found at the White House belonged to the Biden family and White House Press Secretary Karine Jean-Pierre wasn’t having it.
Video:
Reporter: Can you just say once and for all whether or not the cocaine belonged to the Biden family?
KJP: They were not here on Friday, Saturday, Sunday, Monday so to ask that question is incredibly irresponsible.. pic.twitter.com/lZJ4mOfZRY
— Acyn (@Acyn) July 7, 2023
Transcript as provided to PoliticusUSA by the White House:
Q Hi. I’m wondering if you have any comments about recent crime in D.C. It’s raising rates. We’ve lost an SIV applicant from Afghanistan in the most recent killings. Really tragic. Wondering what the White House has to say about that.
And then, secondly, sorry to bring up cocaine again. But there was a question yesterday during press gaggle with Andrew Bates that was — I guess — he said that it had — he didn’t — he was avoiding it because of the Hatch Act.
I’m just asking again: Can you just say once and for all whether or not the cocaine belonged to the Biden family?
MS. JEAN-PIERRE: So, a couple of things there. He mentioned the Hatch Act because the question was posed to him in the Donald —
Q Yes.
MS. JEAN-PIERRE: — using Donald Trump. And so, he was trying to be very mindful.
Q Yeah. I didn’t do that, so —
MS. JEAN-PIERRE: Okay, I hear you. But you’re asking me a question, so I’m answering it for you. And so, that’s why he said the Hatch Act. So I would — you know, have you read the transcript and read the transcript fully so you can see exactly what he was trying to say. So, that’s number one.
So we’re not avoiding the question; that is not true. We’ve answered this question, litigated this question for the last two days exhaustively.
You know, there has been some irresponsible reporting about the family, and — and so I got to call that out here. And I have been very clear. I was clear two days ago when talking about this over and over again, as I was being asked a question.
As you know — and the media outlets reported this — the Biden family was not here. They were not here. They were at Camp David. They were not here Friday. They were not here Saturday. They were not here Sunday. They were not even here Monday.
They came back on Tuesday. So to ask that question is actually incredibly irresponsible. And — and I’ll just leave it there.
It was an irresponsible question. The fact that the Bidens were not at the White House was reported in the original stories on Sunday. There is no reason to ask the question unless the intention is to feed a false narrative by using the White House press briefing as a platform.
Republicans are desperate for a Biden scandal. Tim Scott already tried to blame the found cocaine on President Biden.
Reporters were laughing as it was repeatedly asked about during the White House briefing.
This is not going the way that Republicans thought it might.
The person probably sweating bullets right now isn’t a member of the Biden family, but whoever brought a baggie of cocaine into the White House.
Karine Jean-Pierre wasn’t taking nonsense questions on this, and anyone who asks such a reckless question deserves to be called out.
Jason is the managing editor. He is also a White House Press Pool and a Congressional correspondent for PoliticusUSA. Jason has a Bachelor’s Degree in Political Science. His graduate work focused on public policy, with a specialization in social reform movements.
Awards and Professional Memberships
Member of the Society of Professional Journalists and The American Political Science Association