Throughout the course of presidential history, it hasn’t been uncommon to see the opposition party and the mainstream media give the president some grief over their accessibility as well as the number of times they go on vacation, are seen out golfing, etc.
Though presidents are, of course, rarely ever truly “on vacation” considering all the communication tools they have at their disposal, it’s a part of the game and one we’ve seen play out numerous times over the last 30 or so years alone with former presidents Bill Clinton, George W. Bush, Barack Obama, and Donald Trump.
But with Joe Biden, the particulars are a little different. Unlike others who ran for office in the past, Joe Biden spent the last nine months of his 2020 presidential campaign mostly sequestered in his basement and with limited contact with the media and the public, ostensibly on safety grounds due to the Wuhan virus pandemic.
And after he took office, that basement hideout strategy carried over, although in some instances where it’s happened it’s been in a less obvious way than it was in 2020.
For instance, he’ll appear in public at the White House for a speech or to make an announcement, but rarely takes questions from the press. He’ll give a speech on the road, but many times will simply ignore reporters. On rare occasions when a yelled question from a reporter gets through to Biden, his handlers work to quash it immediately, hurrying Biden away from the throngs of questioners as though they present a threat to his very existence.
He’ll participate in virtual events and summits where the press gets invited, but they’re quickly ushered out with the cameras cut as soon as he’s done giving his canned remarks and/or turns to the other panelists to start talking specifics.
Here we are barely a year and a half into his presidency, and according to the GOP’s Biden vacation tracker, Biden has spent 35% of his time in office on vacation:
What that calendar doesn’t include is how long Biden was quarantined due to his back to back bouts with COVID-19, which kept him behind closed doors for 16 days.
In fact, here’s a look at what Biden’s schedule has looked like since mid-July:
The one blip on that schedule was when he jetted from South Carolina to D.C. to sign the bogusly named “Inflation Reduction Act” on Tuesday, but a few hours after that he was headed out again to his home state of Delaware. I should also note that during some of his time in quarantine, he also made appearances at a few virtual events.
Biden’s disappearance from day to day activities at the White House has become so pronounced in recent weeks that some high-profile officials in his inner circle appear to have taken the reins on his behalf:
While the president is away, Biden’s staff are taking the lead on communications, as they appear to have no interest in putting the president in front of a camera.White House chief of staff Ron Klain briefed Politico’s Playbook on Friday with their August messaging effort, which is underway without the president.“I definitely get more done when he’s not here,” Klain bragged. “No question about it.”He defended hiding Biden from the public, as the president has racked up a record 150 days away from the White House in his home state of Delaware.“I don’t think it’s true he’s out there less than his predecessors,” Klain said. “I just think Donald Trump created an expectation of a president creating a shitstorm every single day.”[…]Susan Rice, Biden’s director of the Domestic Policy Council, also emerged with a messaging strategy about the rise of anger in the country from Trump supporters after the FBI raided former President Donald Trump’s home at Mar-a-Lago.Rice announced details of Biden’s “unity summit” planned in September at the White House.
No doubt Biden’s propensity for gaffes and for frequently coming across as incoherent and out of it are the driving factors for why his interactions with the press and public are so tightly controlled, including in one bizarre incident where a White House comms staffer dressed as an Easter bunny actually shooed him away from talking to onlookers and journalists during the annual White House Easter egg roll earlier this year:
As I’ve said before, one doesn’t need to be conspiracy-minded to believe that all of this is by design, which makes one wonder that considering how often Biden is out of sight and out of mind and not being held accountable by the media, is it really him negotiating all these backroom deals with Sen. Joe Manchin and others or is it those who have been characterized by Biden’s critics as co-presidents, like Klain?
I mean when you consider the purported legislative “victories” he now has under his belt (if his allies in the press are to be believed), you’d think Biden would want to be out front and center. But he’s not.
As author Gabe Fleisher observed, Biden’s light schedule “Calls to mind the 2020 campaign, which Biden won while staying relatively out of sight. Suggests that Biden is most successful when people mostly don’t see/hear from him.”
Make of that what you will.
— Stacey Matthews has also written under the pseudonym “Sister Toldjah” and can be reached via Twitter. —
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