White House journalists’ body slams limited media access at Biden’s Quad meetings

The White House Correspondents’ Association (WHCA) has criticised the limited press access at President Joe Biden’s bilateral meetings at the Quad summit in Delaware and called it “unacceptable”.
The Quad summit took place on Saturday (local time) at Biden’s home in Wilmington, Delaware, and was attended by Prime Minister Narendra Modi, Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese and Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida. Reporters, however, are not allowed to cover bilateral meetings with the White House, citing “security concerns”.
In a tweet, CBS News correspondent Ed O’Keefe said, “The White House blocked the American press from documenting the president’s ‘personal meetings’ with the other leaders of the Quad. But somehow, the Indian delegation was able to broadcast live from the front door of the Biden household.”
In an email, WHCA president and Politico correspondent Eugene Daniels said, “The lack of access to the president of the US for these bilateral meetings due to a location chosen by the White House is unacceptable to the WHCA,” Fox News reported.
Criticising the Biden administration’s stance on press access, Daniels said, “My understanding is that the current posture of the administration is for the press to only see the leaders drive in with no eyes, or cameras on POTUS in this historic moment. I can’t remember a time where this president has had a bilateral meeting on US soil and the press and therefore the American people were blocked from seeing it.”
He acknowledged that even though there were security concerns, it was essential for the people to have direct and independent press accounts of the bilateral meetings of the US President.
Daniels urged the Biden administration to reconsider its strategy of having press access to bilateral meetings.
“[Press staff] has also walked me through what’s happening at the high school and all of that sounds very in line with these kinds of summits, but I request the administration rethink its posture on the bilateral access to adhere to the long-established standards of press access for these kinds of events,” he further said in the email.
Responding to the reporters’ complaints, White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre said there would be “plenty of opportunities” for the reporters.
“There’s going to be plenty of opportunities. It’s not like we’re not allowing all of you to see many other things that are going to develop throughout the day. I just went through them. A quick family photo. He’s going to take them to his high school. You all are going to be there. There’s going to be some really important announcement about cancer moonshot. You all are going to be there,” she said.
“There’s going to be an opportunity to see them when they leave on Saturday as well. You’ll see him saying goodbye to the leaders on Saturday. I hear you all, but can you also appreciate that we have created other opportunities?” she asked.
Reporters said that past presidents had allowed press pools while hosting foreign leaders at their homes.
In response, Jean-Pierre said it was “not unusual” for the American press to not have access to Biden meeting with foreign leaders at his home and stressed how reporters would be able to see the US President and world leaders when they leave, Fox News reported.
She also said that people cared about photo-ops, which she called “important”.
“I think people actually care about photo ops. Photo ops are indeed important, and maybe there will be questions taken during those photo ops. You never know, right? But a formal press conference on this trip is not going to happen with this particular event is not going to happen,” she said.
“We have gone back and forth on many other events. So that’s what I’m saying is not unusual. We wanted to make sure that there was plenty of press access throughout the day, and we believe we have done that. And let’s see how the day goes,” she further said.