KJP’s daily falsehoods disrespect the WH press office

Every work day, Press Secretary Karine Jean-Pierre walks into the tiny White House briefing room to make a prepared statement and then take questions from the press corps.

As the 35th official ever to hold the position, she follows a long line of distinguished professionals who did their best to communicate the truth to the American people while balancing White House political interests and maintaining the high ethical standards required of a journalist.

KJP has been serving in her role since May 13, 2022. After overcoming the usual butterflies-in-the-stomach feeling when she broke into her job, she appears at the podium each day full of confidence. Well qualified, with a Master’s degree in Public Affairs at Columbia University and later, as a lecturer at that Ivy League institution, she boasts stints at NBC and MSNBC to strengthen her resume. She also has a strong political acumen, arguably from the far left, serving as the national spokesperson for Moveon.org and in senior positions with the Obama and Biden campaigns.

But, the problem is that she lies nearly every day and does so fluently with the authority that comes with standing at that lectern. In corporate America and traditional news organizations, most people would lose their jobs after a few such instances. Not so in the Biden administration, where no one has ever been disciplined or fired. Nearly all exits have been voluntary.

KJP’s response to the slowness of the federal government’s response to the Maui fires was characteristically exaggerated and blatantly false. On August 30, she said to Fox News’ Peter Doocey:

So, if you talk to — if you were to do your reporting and speak to the governor of Hawaii, the senators of Hawaii, the folks on the ground, they would say that the President reacted in record time when it came to dealing with the wildfires; when it came to dealing and making sure that they got everything that they need on the federal level to deal with what was going on, on the ground. Let’s not forget that there were more than 600 federal employees on the ground already to assist with the wildfires in Maui.

After watching the disastrous fires and the aftermath in Maui, images carried live on cable news incessantly, even liberal media outlets that have been utterly loyal to Democratic administrations (Hawaii’s governor and congressional representation are Democrats) found fault with the official response, such as this report from the Los Angeles Times.

President Biden chose to remain unplugged from the breaking events of the devastating fire, vacationing at a Delaware beach and keeping out of the public eye over an entire weekend when people were jumping into the ocean to survive. On the Sunday evening after the incident, when more than 85 people had died, Biden answered “no comment” when asked about the death count. Worse, Biden visited Lake Tahoe for another vacation and spent five days there before his Maui trip on August 22, 13 days after the wildfires ravaged the western part of the island. Imagine the fit the press would have thrown if former President Donald Trump had done the same thing.

Social media captured people booing the Biden motorcade in Maui. As of August 24, there were 115 confirmed deaths and 388 individuals unaccounted for in one of the state’s worst disasters.

On August 31, in response to a question on immigration, KJP said:

This President has done more than previous presidents to secure the U.S. border.

As lies stand, this one should get an award. In January, Fox News reported that U.S. border agents confirmed that 1.2 million illegal migrants “got away” from authorities while crossing the border under President Biden’s administration. These are people who are not on any government agency’s radar. An additional one million illegal migrants are awaiting asylum processing – and we know that most will never show up for their hearings.

On China, KJP said:

No president has put the United States … in a stronger position to outcompete China than President Biden.

Again, this assertion is blatantly false. For all the criticisms that Biden heaps on Trump, he has continued most of Trump’s tariffs. His $1 trillion energy policy is a massive boon to China because most of the world’s solar panels and batteries are made there. America continues to depend on China’s manufacturing might.

Earlier, on July 11, KJP tweeted: For all of you wondering, “What is Bidenomics?” 13.2 million jobs created. Unemployment has remained below 4% for the longest stretch since the 1960s. Inflation cut in half. Almost 800k manufacturing jobs were created.” She didn’t care to clarify that the labor force participation has been at the lowest level in decades and that Bidenflation, a TIPP index we created to calculate inflation from February 2021, the first whole month of the Biden term, is 16.2%.

The White House Press Secretary’s position is the most demanding communications role in the world. Every word uttered, expression, and comment not said is parsed by thousands of people each day. It is the closest to official government policy people can get to each day: all they have to do is turn C-SPAN on.

Karine Jean-Pierre has made a mockery of this prestigious office and the very institution that it serves.

1. Ukraine War: UK Arms Giant BAE Systems Sets Up Local Business – BBC

UK defense giant BAE Systems has set up a legal entity in Ukraine, which will allow it to work directly with Ukraine to explore potential partners and ultimately produce light artillery there.

Kyiv is eager to boost its supplies of weapons and other military equipment and create jobs in an economy hit hard by the war.

2. UN Chief Sends Proposals To Russia To Revive Black Sea Grain Deal – Reuters

United Nations Secretary-General Antonio Guterres said that he had sent Russian FM Sergei Lavrov “a set of concrete proposals” to revive a deal for the safe export of Ukrainian grain via the Black Sea.

A Russian diplomat said “there are no revelations” in Antonio Guterres’ letter to Lavrov and that it just “sums up of previous UN ideas, which didn’t fly.”

Antonio Guterres’ letter comes ahead of a meeting between Russian President Vladimir Putin and his Turkish counterpart Tayyip Erdogan.

3. Zelenskyy Says Ukraine Deployed New Long-Range Weapon, Hints At Russia Raid – Al Jazeera

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said his country has developed a weapon that can hit a target 435 miles away, in an apparent reference to an aerial attack this week on an airport in western Russia that destroyed several military aircraft.

While Ukraine rarely comments directly on specific attacks inside Russia, Zelenskyy appeared to hint twice on Thursday that Ukrainian forces were behind the Pskov attack.

4. Russia Stages Local Elections In Occupied Parts Of Ukraine – Reuters

Russia does not fully control any of the four regions where the votes are being held – Donetsk, Luhansk, Zaporizhzhia, and Kherson. Along with Crimea – annexed by Moscow in 2014 – they make up almost a fifth of Ukraine.

Ukrainian officials say the elections are also illegal and show why holding any peace talks with Moscow is impossible until Russia withdraws all its troops from Ukrainian territory.

5. I Hope Xi Jinping Attends G20 Summit In New Delhi, Says Biden – WION

There are reports that Chinese President Xi Jinping might skip the G20 Summit set to take place in India next week.

U.S. officials played down the possibility of a Biden-Xi meeting in New Delhi. The officials suggested that it is more likely that the two leaders would meet at the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation conference, which is due to be held in San Francisco in November.

6. New China Map Draws More Rejection, 4 Asian Countries Back India’s Call – Bloomberg

According to a statement, Vietnam said China’s official map violates its sovereignty over the Spratly and Paracel Islands and jurisdiction over its waters.

Other countries have also rejected the map. India took issue with a part of the map that shows sections of Arunachal Pradesh under China’s control. The Philippines said it doesn’t recognize China’s expansive claims in the South China Sea. The governments of Malaysia and Taiwan have also issued strongly worded statements accusing Beijing of claiming their territory.

7. U.S. OKs First Army Aid To Taiwan – AFP

For the first time, President Joe Biden’s administration has approved direct U.S. military aid to Taiwan under an assistance program aimed at foreign governments, officials said.

The State Department informed the U.S. Congress of the $80-million package, which is small compared with recent sales to Taiwan but marks the first assistance to Taipei under the Foreign Military Financing program, which generally involves grants or loans to sovereign countries.

8. China’s ‘Replica’ Guns For Solomon Islands Likely Real, U.S. Cable Claimed – Al Jazeera

China likely shipped genuine firearms to the Solomon Islands when its donation of “replica” weapons to police last year sparked a political firestorm, a previously unseen diplomatic cable claimed.

Police in the Solomon Islands said they received imitation firearms from China for training purposes after claims in local media of a secret illicit weapons shipment in March 2022 prompted an outcry from residents and opposition politicians.

9. UK Defense Secretary Ben Wallace Resigns – AFP

Britain’s Defense Secretary Ben Wallace, who announced he would step down in the next UK government cabinet reshuffle last month, has resigned, the prime minister’s office said.

Wallace, a former army officer, had been the UK’s pick to succeed Jens Stoltenberg as NATO secretary general. But he failed to get crucial U.S. backing to replace him, and Stoltenberg has now extended his term at the head of the alliance.

10. Senior U.S. Envoy Looks Into Possibilities For Solving Lebanon-Israel Border Dispute – A.P.

Amos Hochstein, a senior advisor to President Joe Biden visiting Beirut, said that Washington is looking into possibilities for solving a decades-old border dispute.

He also expressed disappointment with Lebanon’s reluctance to implement reforms amid the country’s historic economic meltdown.

Hochstein last year brokered a maritime border deal between Lebanon and Israel, paving the way for gas exploration in the area.

11. U.S., South Korea, Japan Sanction North Korea’s Weapons Development Program – UPI

The ally nations separately imposed the sanctions a day after Pyongyang launched two ballistic missiles in what it called a tactical nuclear strike drill and a week after it failed its second attempt at launching a reconnaissance orbital into space.

12. Japan’s Defense Ministry Seeks Record $53B Military Budget For 2024 – UPI

The Japanese Defense Ministry requested its largest-ever defense budget following record defense spending last year in response to threats from China, North Korea, and Russia.

The ministry asked for a $53 billion military budget for fiscal 2024, a roughly 12% increase.

The higher spending on defense is consistent with Prime Minister Fumio Kishida’s new National Security Strategy and National Defense Program, which calls for a five-year military spending of $315 billion.

13. Aung San Suu Kyi’s Appeal Dismissed By Junta’s High Court – RFA

The military junta’s Supreme Court rejected an appeal filed by lawyers for the deposed Myanmar leader Aung San Suu Kyi.

The decision comes a month after a junta pardon reduced her total prison sentence from 33 years to 27 years. But the whereabouts of Myanmar’s 78-year-old former de facto leader remains unclear.

The military detained Suu Kyi and other top leaders of the NLD in a Feb. 1, 2021, coup d’etat.

Republished with permission from TIPP Insights