The Media Research Center’s Curtis Houck praised a non-Doocy Fox News employee for promoting right-wing narratives at the March 1 White House press briefing:
In a Friday White House press briefing that perhaps flew under the radar, Fox’s Jacqui Heinrich threw down with a flustered Press Secretary Karine Jean-Pierre over the ongoing Biden border crisis, including her pointing out the President’s hesitation to act via executive order on the border was curious given his penchant to use the pen on issues like student loans.
Heinrich cut right to the case: “Is the administration coming around to the idea that physical border barriers work?”
As Heinrich’s colleague Bill Melugin tweeted, Jean-Pierre was clearly not ready: “Can you say more? Where is this — what do you mean? Where’s this coming from?”
Heinrich then explained: “[I]t’s been six weeks since you guys won the Supreme Court case that would have allowed you to remove razor wire at the Texas border that you guys argued was — there’s an emergency, immediate need to take down, but it’s still up.”
Asked why that’s the case, a flat-footed Jean-Pierre punted to the Department of Homeland Security, insisting “I just don’t have anything for you on that.”
[…]Jean-Pierre countered Biden has “taken action over the last three years” but “Republicans [are] getting in the way” of making lasting changes.
To this, Heinrich noted how, “in the meantime, while [the President’s] shaming people for not acting, he is also not acting.”
Jean-Pierre lost it, declaring “[t]hat is so false” and Republicans need to answer “what’s the problem” with backing Biden’s policies.
Okay, sure.
Houck looped his mancrush into his usual Fox News praise in his writeup of the March 5 briefing:
Despite the political world being focused Tuesday on the slew of presidential primaries, there was still a White House press briefing and, thankfully, Fox’s Peter Doocy and Fox Business’s Edward Lawrence were there to hold the ever-inept Karine Jean-Pierre to account on the border, inflation, Laken Riley’s murder, and President Biden’s growing need for notecards to function.
Doocy went second in Jean-Pierre’s portion and, on the border, it concerned an interview on CBS’s 60 Minutes with the head of the Border Patrol from Biden’s first two years in office: “How’s President Biden going to fix the border if he can go years without talking to the head of Border Patrol?”
Jean-Pierre initially played dumb, but after Doocy mentioned Raul Ortiz saying in the interview that he never once spoke to Biden or Harris did Jean-Pierre answer, claiming “he was invited, I believe, to participate in the President’s…visit to El Paso…in January of 2023 and he did not attend.”
Jean-Pierre then attacked Republicans, saying they’re unconcerned about the border “because of what the former President, Donald Trump, told them to do — told him to reject” the bipartisan Senate deal.
This led to Doocy’s question about Laken Riley: “[W]ill President Biden publicly address Laken Riley’s murder allegedly at the hands of an illegal immigrant, was released by law enforcement multiple times on Thursday night. I know he’s cut a statement, but what about at the State of the Union?”
As usual, Jean-Pierre’s answer consisted of constantly tripping over her words, insisting “I do want to always acknowledge and extend our deepest condolences” to her loved ones, but wouldn’t commit to anything concerning the State of the Union.
Houck then huffed that “Jean-Pierre callously linked Riley’s murder to Republicans not taking the Senate border deal supported by the White House” — even though he and his fellow Republicans have been callously exploiting Riley’s death for political purposes. He then praised another Fox News reporter for spouting conservatively correct talking points:
Lawrence drew a miffed and somewhat angry response from Jean-Pierre when he pointed to Biden needing notecards to make it through even germane public appearance: “The President — I noticed, had — had note cards at the border when he was doing his briefing there. He also had note cards last Friday with the Italian prime minister. Why does the President relies so heavily on note cards?”
“You’re upset because the President has no cards? You’re — you’re asking me a question about the President having note cards,” she seethed as Lawrence clapped back that he’s “not upset” but merely “asking why”.
Instead, Jean-Pierre continued to lecture him for daring to ask that when Biden “has had — a — probably one of the most successful first three years of an — an administration than any modern day president” and “done more…than most presidents who had two terms.”
Amid a slew of shouts and even Newsmax’s James Rosen joining in, Lawrence insisted he’s simply wondering “why he relies so heavily on notecards,” but Jean-Pierre ignored it: “I think what’s important here and what the American people care about is how this President is delivering for — for them, and that’s what he’s doing. And that’s what’s the most important thing here.”
Houck censored the fact that most presidents have relied on notecards.