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    Biden and the Increasingly Anxious Democrats

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    Michael D. Shear, a longtime White House reporter for The New York Times, talks about recent staff turnover in the administration and frustration around the president.Despite signs that Democrats may be in better shape in the midterms than many expected six months ago, a widespread malaise is setting in within the White House. There is a growing sense that President Biden is not prosecuting a political case against Republicans aggressively enough.I spoke today with Michael D. Shear, a longtime political reporter and Pulitzer Prize winner who has covered the White House for the past 13 years.Shear has seen plenty of drama over that time: He covered all four years of Donald Trump’s presidency, including two impeachment inquiries, and he and Julie Hirschfeld Davis wrote “Border Wars: Inside Trump’s Assault on Immigration.”Our conversation, lightly edited for length and clarity:You wrote this week: “At a moment of broad political tumult and economic distress, Mr. Biden has appeared far less engaged than many of his supporters had hoped. While many Democrats are pleading for a fighter who gives voice to their anger, Mr. Biden has chosen a more passive path — blaming Congress, urging people to vote and avoiding heated rhetorical battles.” What are your sources telling you?The concern among Democrats about the White House, and in particular about President Biden’s political skills, is palpable. The main issue seems to be a performative one. Democrats want Biden to seem tougher, more engaged and more in the moment.It was striking to me that in a week when there were so many big, sweeping issues — Roe v. Wade, inflation, recession fears, mass shootings — you wouldn’t have known it from the president’s schedule. He awarded the Medal of Honor to four Vietnam-era soldiers (a worthy thing, for sure), gave a speech on pensions and then awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom to 17 people.There has been a string of departures and arrivals at the White House lately. Cedric Richmond, the director of the Office of Public Engagement, and Jen Psaki, the press secretary, have left. Kate Bedingfield, the communications director, is departing. Anita Dunn, who was a top aide to both Barack Obama and Biden, is returning from her consulting firm.What’s going on here? Is this connected to a feeling of low morale inside the White House? Or just the usual personnel turmoil that happens inside every administration?I think the turnover in the communications shop is a bit of both.There is burnout in every administration around this time; many of the people who start an administration worked like crazy on the campaign, and they are tired.And Ron Klain, the White House chief of staff, has made it clear to people that if they wanted to leave, they should do it sooner rather than later in an election year. Thus Psaki and Richmond have left recently.The Biden PresidencyWith midterm elections looming, here’s where President Biden stands.Struggling to Inspire: At a time of political tumult and economic distress, President Biden has appeared less engaged than Democrats had hoped.Low Approval Rating: Despite early warnings from his pollster, Mr. Biden’s approval among Americans has reached the lowest level of his presidency.Rallying Allies: Faced with Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, Mr. Biden has set out to bolster the West and outline a more muscular NATO.Staff Changes: An increasing number of West Wing departures has added to the sense of frustration inside the Biden White House.Looking Ahead to 2024: Amid doubts from Democrats, aides say Mr. Biden is irked by persistent questions over his plans to seek re-election.Bedingfield has been working nonstop for Biden since 2015, and I’m told she has been debating when to leave for a while. The fact that Anita Dunn — a veteran communications czar for Democratic presidents — was recently brought back on was the writing on the wall.But having said all that, I do think morale is low right now. The president’s polling numbers are low, the problems are myriad and one of the first places that critics look to place blame is with the communications staff. The problem for this White House is that if predictions come true and Republicans take over in Congress, things will just get bleaker.What do people in and around Biden’s political operation make of all the reporting, including from our colleagues, that shows Trump is weighing the announcement of a 2024 bid earlier than expected?There is no question that the White House is paying close attention to this question.There is a belief among some people close to the president that a formal Trump candidacy will provide an effective foil for Biden and will energize him much the way he was energized during the 2020 campaign. The threat of Trump was, after all, Biden’s stated reason for running in the first place.There’s also a belief — maybe more of a hope — that an early decision by Trump to announce that he is running could hurt Republican candidates this fall. It would force the political discourse away from issues that benefit Republicans, like inflation, and toward subjects that are more favorable to Democrats, like Trump’s rantings about Jan. 6 and a “stolen” 2020 election.There also will be legal issues and questions about whether the president needs to start a re-election effort sooner as a result — so he can start to raise money. But those questions are still being hashed out.Cedric Richmond, a former top White House aide, pushed back against Democratic criticism of President Biden. Stefani Reynolds for The New York TimesWhen I speak with Democrats running campaigns or working at party committees, I hear a lot of frustration with the White House and a lot of criticism, specifically about Biden’s political acumen. Are White House officials aware of the extent of the complaints?David Plouffe, one of the architects of Obama’s presidential campaigns, famously dismissed complaints from Democrats as “bed-wetting” by overly anxious partisans.The current White House doesn’t use that phrase, but the sentiment is basically the same.I talked this week to Cedric Richmond, one of Biden’s earliest and most fervent supporters, who was a top White House aide until he departed recently for the Democratic National Committee.He did not hold back.“We have to have some discipline as Democrats in what we’re talking about, and not be going off on tangents that are destructive to where we want to be,” Richmond said, referring to the sniping at Biden from members of his own party.“So go out there and show the difference between the two parties,” he said. “But the circular firing squad, I think, is a self-fulfilling prophecy.”What are people inside the White House most optimistic about regarding 2022 and 2024? What do they think, or hope, the main drivers of the midterm elections will be?For a long time, there was a hope inside the West Wing that inflation would subside by the time the election came around.That is no longer a realistic hope, given the situation internationally, including the Russia-Ukraine war. The president’s advisers are mostly cleareyed about how the deck is stacked against them in 2022.But they are optimistic about a few things: They think — hope — that Covid is receding as a major political issue, given the relative success of the vaccination program. They think the underlying economy — job growth, wage increases, manufacturing — is strong. And they argue that Biden has accomplished more than he currently gets credit for.The worry about all of those things is the possibility of reversal. Covid could surge again. Job growth could slow. And the accomplishments could fade further into the rearview mirror if the rest of the year is simply a political stalemate.We want to hear from you.Tell us about your experience with this newsletter by answering this short survey.What to read tonightBoris Johnson, Britain’s prime minister, announced his plans to resign as unrest grows over his handling of inflation and the economic aftermath of the coronavirus pandemic. Johnson was a close Trump ally.The I.R.S. said its commissioner asked the Treasury Department’s inspector general for tax administration to look into audits of James B. Comey and Andrew G. McCabe, Michael S. Schmidt and Glenn Thrush report.The Atlantic has a fresh excerpt from the new book by Mark Leibovich, a former New York Times writer. Headlined “The Most Pathetic Men in America,” the excerpt skewers Senator Lindsey Graham, Representative Kevin McCarthy and, as Leibovich puts it, “so many other cowards in Congress.”SHENANIGANSGov. Gavin Newsom of California has been criticized for taking a personal trip to Montana.Jim Wilson/The New York TimesYou win some, you NewsomGavin Newsom, the governor of California, is being put through the political wringer once again — this time, over a family vacation in Montana.As On Politics has noted, Newsom has carved out a national role for himself as a leading critic of Republican-led states. Montana, despite having a Democratic-friendly, “prairie populist” streak, is deeply red: Trump won the state by more than 16 percentage points in the 2020 presidential election.It’s also a place that holds special meaning for Newsom, who married his second wife there. The couple even named their older daughter Montana. His in-laws own a ranch along the Bitterroot River and still live there.The problem, politically speaking, is that Montana is on liberal California’s travel ban list. State-funded travel to Montana and 21 other states is barred in California, through a law enacted in 2016 under Newsom’s predecessor, Jerry Brown. The restrictions, which are enforced by the California Department of Justice, were put in place to punish states whose laws were deemed discriminatory toward the L.G.B.T.Q. community.Newsom paid for the trip himself, and the travel ban does not apply to personal vacations, as his aides have pointed out. Still Republicans have seized on the episode to accuse the governor of hypocrisy. Sometimes, when you poke the G.O.P. bear, as Newsom did when he joined Donald Trump’s social media network and ran ads on Fox News stations in Florida, the bear pokes back.It “must be hard for his family to meet all the woke rules that he and the ‘Regressives have created for themselves,” James Gallagher, the Republican leader of the State Assembly, posted on Twitter.The criticisms echoed one of the more politically potent attacks on Newsom. When the governor dined, indoors and without a mask, at a pricey Napa Valley restaurant in 2020 at the height of the coronavirus lockdowns, his critics said Newsom believed the rules didn’t apply to him.And while California did not pay for Newsom’s Montana trip, the state did pay for his security detail.Anthony York, a spokesman for Newsom, said the trip was very much a personal, and not political, one. “His kids are visiting their grandparents for his daughter’s birthday, as they do every year,” he said.York denied that Newsom’s office was being coy about his whereabouts, and said that the office was trying to balance transparency with safety. “On the security side, the law explicitly states there is an exemption for public safety, and the governor has to travel with security,” he said.Is there anything you think we’re missing? Anything you want to see more of? We’d love to hear from you. Email us at onpolitics@nytimes.com. More

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      Four Women Who Will Handle the Media in the Biden White House

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      #masthead-section-label, #masthead-bar-one { display: none }The Presidential TransitionliveLatest UpdatesFormal Transition BeginsBiden’s CabinetSecretary of StateElection ResultsAdvertisementContinue reading the main storySupported byContinue reading the main storyFour Women Who Will Handle the Media in the Biden White HousePresident-elect Joe Biden is entering office with the stated intent of restoring credibility to government — and to the White House briefing room.The relationship between a White House press office seeking to portray the president and his decisions in the best light possible and the news media seeking to separate fact from spin is designed to be adversarial.Credit…Kriston Jae Bethel for The New York TimesDec. 1, 2020Updated 8:05 p.m. ETWASHINGTON — In one of President-elect Joseph R. Biden Jr.’s closing campaign advertisements, he promised a “new world coming” if Americans voted for “honor,” “decency,” “respect of office” and “truth.”The restoration of “truth” was illustrated in the ad by a photograph of the podium in the White House briefing room, which under President Trump has been used to disseminate falsehoods and to undermine the credibility of a news media that his aides have referred to as the “opposition party.” The White House press secretary, Kayleigh McEnany, for instance, recently refused to take a question from a CNN correspondent, saying, “I don’t call on activists.”It was in the briefing room that Mr. Trump suggested that an “injection inside” the human body with a disinfectant like bleach or isopropyl alcohol could help combat the coronavirus; and where his first press secretary, Sean Spicer, set the tone for the administration when he falsely claimed that the president’s inauguration crowd was the “largest audience to ever witness an inauguration, period, both in person and around the globe.”The relationship between a White House press office seeking to portray the president and his decisions in the best light possible and the news media seeking to separate fact from spin is designed to be adversarial.But Mr. Biden is entering office with the stated intent of restoring credibility to government — and to the briefing room. His advisers have said that the communications team will endeavor for a return to pre-Trump “normalcy.” And that seemed to be reflected in the communications team he announced this week. — Annie KarniCredit…Charles Dharapak/Associated PressJennifer PsakiPress secretaryMr. Biden’s choice of Jennifer Psaki, 42, a veteran of the Obama administration who is generally viewed by reporters as fair and accessible, as his chief spokeswoman embodies that return to normalcy approach.Ms. Psaki, a former White House communications director and State Department spokeswoman, did not work on the Biden campaign. But she was brought in by two top Biden advisers, Jeffrey D. Zients and Anita Dunn, to help with the transition. Mr. Biden’s decision to appoint Ms. Psaki as press secretary, a role in which she will become one of the most recognizable faces of the new administration, came together in a rush of meetings over the past 10 days.Mr. Biden, officials said, was particularly drawn to Ms. Psaki by her background at the State Department. There, she worked under Secretary of State John Kerry and grew comfortable delivering 90-minute briefings on foreign policy issues, like a dispute over the South China Sea.At the White House, Ms. Psaki intends to bring back the daily press briefing, which has been all but phased out over the past four years. It is not clear, however, when those sessions might resume, given the constraints of the pandemic.But as the incoming administration prepares to roll out a coronavirus vaccine and convince more than 300 million Americans that it is safe, Ms. Psaki, colleagues said, views a central part of her job as restoring faith in the words spoken from behind the podium.“The clown games are over,” said Susan Rice, who was President Barack Obama’s national security adviser. “Jen will represent the professionalism and decency and commitment to transparency that has been a hallmark of Joe Biden’s career.”As Mr. Trump’s press secretary, Ms. McEnany has focused on remaining in the president’s inner circle and has made little effort to be accessible to reporters or to disseminate accurate information. Ms. Psaki plans to take a different approach, Biden transition officials said.At the State Department, they noted, Ms. Psaki moved the spokesperson’s office, which had been on the sixth floor, where it was inaccessible to reporters, to be next to the press room.Ms. Psaki, pronounced SOCK-ee, was a candidate for the press secretary’s job under Mr. Obama, but she is arguably coming into it now at a more difficult and more critical moment.“I think she brings as much experience in that building, as much as anyone has ever brought to the job,” said Robert Gibbs, who served as Mr. Obama’s first White House press secretary. “The world this administration inherits has more challenges than any in nearly a century. Having a steady, experienced voice behind that podium will serve them well.”Since leaving government, Ms. Psaki has worked as a senior vice president and managing director for the Washington office of Global Strategy Group, a public relations firm that works with corporate, nonprofit and political clients, and has served a principal at WestExec Advisors, a consulting firm founded by Antony J. Blinken, Mr. Biden’s choice for secretary of state.Ms. Psaki, a graduate of the College of William and Mary, was most recently a nonresident scholar at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, a Washington-based think tank, and a paid contributor on CNN, a position she left in September.She is expected to have access to Mr. Biden, whom she has known for 12 years.“The name of the game is access,” Mr. Gibbs said. “Are you in the meetings? Some of the best prep for the briefing itself was being in the meeting — understanding where the president’s head was and where the debate was going.” — Annie KarniCredit…Biden-Harris TransitionKate BedingfieldCommunications directorKate Bedingfield has spent the past two years as one of the most visible public faces of the Biden campaign. As communications director, she will help shape the message for the president and the White House.Mr. Biden is known for turning to loyal advisers, and Ms. Bedingfield has been a trusted aide since 2015, when she joined the vice president’s staff as communications director as he was weighing whether to run for president in 2016.She was an original member of his 2020 campaign, serving as a deputy campaign manager and communications director. In that role, she often appeared on television as a surrogate for Mr. Biden, sometimes from her bedroom because of the pandemic.With Ms. Bedingfield running the communications operation, the campaign’s message of unifying the country remained consistent from Day 1 through Election Day, even amid criticism and second-guessing from some Democrats.During the campaign, she was forced to navigate a number of public relations challenges, including the attacks from Mr. Trump and his allies on Mr. Biden’s son Hunter Biden and his business dealings in Ukraine. Ms. Bedingfield and her team did not hesitate to press reporters on the word choices they made in describing the baseless accusations against Mr. Biden and his son.Ms. Bedingfield was also charged with trying to make a positive case for Mr. Biden after he finished fourth in the Iowa caucuses and fifth in the New Hampshire primary, low points on the Biden campaign that at the time raised serious doubts about his path to the Democratic presidential nomination.The Presidential TransitionLatest UpdatesUpdated Dec. 1, 2020, 9:04 p.m. ETIn Fox interview, Parscale blames Trump’s lack of empathy about coronavirus for election loss.Biden announces top members of his economic team as he contends with a recovery strategy.Biden introduces a new companion for the next few weeks: a walking boot.“The job she did in the campaign is underappreciated,” said Jennifer Palmieri, who served as White House communications director for Mr. Obama. “When a candidate comes in with the expectations and experience of Joe Biden and then falls so dramatically as he did, where he came in fourth and fifth, to hold a campaign together and keep the candidate focused and upbeat and optimistic is a very difficult task.”Ms. Bedingfield, 39, who grew up in the Atlanta area and is a graduate of the University of Virginia, worked on John Edwards’s 2008 presidential campaign and in the Obama White House during Mr. Obama’s first term.She later worked as vice president of corporate communications for the Motion Picture Association of America and as vice president of communications for Monumental Sports & Entertainment, which owns the N.B.A.’s Washington Wizards, the N.H.L.’s Washington Capitals and the W.N.B.A.’s Washington Mystics. — Thomas KaplanCredit…Kimberly White/Getty Images For MoveonKarine Jean-PierrePrincipal deputy press secretary The president-elect is an institutionalist, a deal-making centrist and a consummate political insider who has hired a number of top advisers with backgrounds rooted in the traditional corridors of Washington power.One of his newly selected press aides brings a notably different perspective to the team.Karine Jean-Pierre, who was named Mr. Biden’s principal deputy press secretary, has held a number of governmental and campaign roles. But she is steeped in grass-roots progressive activism, too, as a former chief public affairs officer at the liberal group MoveOn. She is also a former political analyst for NBC and MSNBC.Ms. Jean-Pierre has also spoken about her belief that her identity as a woman of color and daughter of Haitian immigrants cut a sharp contrast with the divisive and at times racist rhetoric promoted by Mr. Trump.“I am everything that Donald Trump hates,” she said in a video she filmed for MoveOn. “I’m a Black woman, I’m gay, I am a mom. Both my parents were born in Haiti.”Ms. Jean-Pierre, 46, served in the Obama White House and worked on Mr. Obama’s 2008 and 2012 campaigns. She was also a deputy campaign manager for the unsuccessful presidential campaign of Martin O’Malley, a former governor of Maryland, in 2016. But she was not an original member of the Biden campaign, arriving as a senior adviser last spring after Jennifer O’Malley Dillon was brought on as campaign manager.Ms. Jean-Pierre later served as the chief of staff for Mr. Biden’s running mate, Senator Kamala Harris. That job gave Ms. Jean-Pierre access to the candidate but did not require her to engage in the daily sparring with journalists that she may need to do in her new role, in which she is expected to work closely with Ms. Psaki.Ms. Jean-Pierre, a graduate of the New York Institute of Technology and Columbia’s School of International and Public Affairs, came up in New York politics, describing former Mayor David N. Dinkins, who recently died, as a mentor. “She will bring a steadiness, an evenness,” said Leah Daughtry, a veteran Democratic strategist who knows Ms. Jean-Pierre from New York. “She also brings her own experience as the daughter of immigrants, as someone from the queer community, as someone who’s a New Yorker.” — Katie Glueck and Thomas KaplanCredit…Brad Barket/Getty Images for MTV NewsSymone D. SandersSenior adviser and chief spokeswoman for Vice President-elect Kamala HarrisAs Mr. Biden reveled in his Super Tuesday victories in March in a speech in California, two protesters threatened to ruin the moment, climbing onstage with the septuagenarian candidate.Symone D. Sanders did not waste any time. She charged forward and, with the help of Mr. Biden’s wife, Jill Biden, and several aides, hauled one of the protesters away.Ms. Sanders is no stranger to brawling on behalf of her boss. She served as an outspoken senior adviser to Mr. Biden’s presidential campaign, emerging as a prolific surrogate at news conferences and on social media.Now, she will be a senior adviser and chief spokeswoman for Ms. Harris, whom she advised during the general election, traveling with her and assisting with debate preparations. Ms. Sanders is expected to play key roles both in guiding the press operation and in advising as Ms. Harris pursues her own initiatives as vice president.“She’s going to be able to work both worlds very, very well,” said Representative Cedric L. Richmond, Democrat of Louisiana and an incoming senior adviser to Mr. Biden in the White House.Ms. Sanders, 30, a Nebraska native, is fluent in both the language of the left and internet discourse — in contrast to some of Mr. Biden’s longer-serving advisers — and she was an important point of contact for several key political constituencies during the race.But she does not have the decades of traditional campaign and Washington experience that many in Mr. Biden’s orbit value. Indeed, she signed on with the Biden campaign after working as press secretary for Senator Bernie Sanders’s 2016 presidential campaign at age 25.Yet a combination of loyalty to Mr. Biden and a different perspective from many in his inner circle helped Ms. Sanders become an important and respected voice in the campaign, and she was mentioned as a possible White House press secretary.In the vice president’s office, Ms. Sanders will work closely with Ashley Etienne, the communications director for Ms. Harris who is a veteran of the Obama administration and also served as a top aide to Speaker Nancy Pelosi.This year, Ms. Sanders, a graduate of Creighton University, published a book titled, “No, You Shut Up: Speaking Truth to Power and Reclaiming America.” She has also done strategic communications consulting work, but does not intend to continue that while in government.In an interview, Ms. Sanders, who is Black, noted that the transition had rolled out at one time the White House communications team’s leadership, made up entirely of women — both white women and women of color.“The most qualified people for the job also happen to all be women,” she said. “That is historic. Not too long ago, the powers that be would not have picked us.” — Katie GlueckAdvertisementContinue reading the main story More