In a year-end review, Fox News media reporter Joseph Wulfsohn underlined that 2023 was another year in which President Biden largely avoided solo press conferences (three!) and serious newsmaker interviews. He ended the year on a podcast with comedian Conan O'Brien, not with a press conference or a hard-hitting journalist one-on-one.
Biden promised he would be kinder to the press than Trump, but that has only meant he hasn't trashed them as "fake news," and why would he? They're all in his corner. But he doesn't grant access unless an interviewer demonstrates they won't be "trouble." Interviewers have mostly skipped asking Hunter Biden questions.
In February, instead of a traditional Super Bowl interview with Fox -- the White House even said no to actress Vivica A. Fox on "Fox Soul"! -- he talked before the game to sympathetic PBS NewsHour host Judy Woodruff.
She asked “One of the things Republicans say is a priority for them is investigating your family. Your son Hunter, your brother Jim...how do you plan to deal with that?” Biden replied “the public is not going to pay attention to that. They want these guys to do something. If the only thing they can do is make up things about my family, it's not going to go very far.”
Also in that month, ABC World News Tonight anchor David Muir interviewed Biden, and asked two questions about how Biden's pile of classified documents in his garage was different than Trump. Biden protested there are "degrees of irresponsibility."
Wulfsohn noted that was followed by a string of friendly interviews in the spring with The Daily Show guest host (and former Obama aide) Kal Penn, NBC weatherman (and Biden superfan) Al Roker and MSNBC's Joe Scarborough.
The last time Biden was asked about the troubles facing Hunter in a formal setting was before he was indicted. MSNBC host Stephanie Ruhle ended a completely puffball interview with this exchange:
Ruhle wrapped up the interview by asking about Hunter, almost being apologetic for even bringing it up, “Sir, there is 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 defended Hunter: “First of all, my son’s done nothing wrong. I trust him, I have faith in him, and it impacts my presidency by making me feel proud of him.”
After the interview, during the panel discussion recap, Ruhle added “And that son is not part of the administration, he doesn’t have a job in government, he's a private citizen. That is a contrast to family members of President Trump who were senior advisers in the White House.”
Wulfsohn reported it's been all puffery without scandal questions since then:
Since then, Biden granted interviews with MSNBC's Nicolle Wallace, CNN's Fareed Zakaria, British wellness podcast host Jay Shatt, The Weather Channel's Stephanie Abrams, ProPublica's John Harwood, CBS correspondent Scott Pelley on "60 Minutes," Spanish radio host Tony Arias, CNN's Anderson Cooper on his podcast about grief and comedian Conan O'Brien, marking his final sit-down of 2023.
All of them avoided the subject.
This should underline the suspicion that Team Biden makes it a condition of getting an interview that you don't "get personal" and ask about Hunter or his brother Jimmy influence-peddling with our enemies.
In more informal settings, Biden gave a statement on Ukraine a few weeks ago, and New York Post reporter Steven Nelson asked why he had so many interactions with the clients of Hunter and James Biden. "I'm not going to comment. I did not, and it's just a bunch of lies," Biden said. "They're lies. I did not. They're lies."
This is why he avoids press conferences. But the pro-Biden media -- even the "Truth"-loving newspapers -- largely replayed that baloney without fact-checking.
Wulfsohn ended by reprising a quote he reported from New York Times reporter Zolan Kanno-Young at the liberal Texas Tribune festival back in September: "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."
They all know Biden has interacted with Hunter's clients, and they don't want to dwell on it -- and they don't want to make Biden look bad when he lies his face off about it.
