Communication staffers in the White House reportedly have a rocky relationship with the New York Times, which they accuse of unfair treatment and entitlement.
As a result, the White House refuses to allow the Times to interview Biden, whom the paper suspects of being unfit for office, Politico’s Eli Stokols reported.
“[O]nly an interview with a paper like the Times can verify that the 81-year-old Biden is still fit to hold the presidency,” Times‘ publisher A.G. Sulzberger believes, according to Politico’s report based on two people familiar with his private comments.
Politico reported the ensuing fallout on the question of Biden’s age:
[L]ast May, when Vice President Kamala Harris arrived at the newspaper’s midtown headquarters for an off-the-record meeting with around 40 Times journalists, Sulzberger devoted several minutes to asking her why Biden was still refusing to grant the paper — or any major newspaper — an interview. Harris, according to three people in the room that day, suggested that he contact the White House press office and later grumbled to aides about the back-and-forth being a waste of the allotted time.
A few months later, with the Times’ White House team still banned from the embargoed list and frustrations on both sides mounting, senior administration officials invited Executive Editor Joe Kahn, Managing Editor Carolyn Ryan and Bumiller to the White House. Although there was some discussion inside the Times of whether Kahn should respond to a summons to Washington from anyone besides the president himself, he decided to go, largely to make the case for Biden to do an interview.
The meeting with senior adviser Anita Dunn and communications director Ben LaBolt was not unlike many held from time to time with executives from other newspapers and TV networks, an exchange of views about the outlet’s coverage, a pitch for more access and an interview. Dunn and LaBolt went through a list of complaints: the unrelenting focus on polls and age, reporters not giving the White House much time to respond to stories prior to publication. The Times brass listened and sought to explain the principles guiding its coverage. The meeting, according to three people on both sides familiar with the conversation, was not especially contentious. One sign of a slight thaw in relations came weeks later when the White House invited Kahn and his wife to attend a state dinner for the Australian prime minister in October.
“But the pleas for an interview have gone nowhere,” Politico reported.
Politico reported multiple grievances from both parties that fostered the relationship it characterized as “tense, beset by misunderstandings, grudges and a general lack of trust.”
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White House grievances:
- Attributing quotes to a direct White House staffer and refusing via a “punitive response” to change the attribution
- Being “institutionally aligned toward Warren and progressives”
- “Willingness to legitimize rumors swirling around Hunter Biden”
- Publishing “low numbers in the NYT’s approval poll”
- Writing stories about Biden’s age
- Claims that Times staffers are “entitled”
New York Times grievances:
- Removing “all Times’ reporters from its ‘tier one’ email list for background information about various briefings”
- Not “invited” to Biden’s first public appearance
- Refusing to grant the Times an interview
- Inability to confirm Biden, 81 as capable of running country
Wendell Husebo is a political reporter with Breitbart News and a former GOP War Room Analyst. He is the author of Politics of Slave Morality. Follow Wendell on “X” @WendellHusebø or on Truth Social @WendellHusebo.