White House pressed on alleged Biden-Harris 'awkwardness' after Trump victory
Fox News senior White House correspondent Peter Doocy questions White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre on reported tension after the election and whether President Biden will ask Trump to pardon his son Hunter.
White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre on Tuesday took exception to Fox News senior White House correspondent Peter Doocy's question about whether President Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris’ recent lunch was "awkward."
"We know that today, a week after the election, President Biden and Vice President Harris had a private lunch. How awkward was that?" Doocy asked after a series of other questions.
"I don't even understand. Why would it, why would it be awkward?" Jean-Pierre responded.
Doocy explained, "The president got squeezed out for her, and then she kept him at arm's length, and then she lost. And now she's back."
President-elect Donald Trump is pictured in front of the White House. (Getty Images/AP Images)
Jean-Pierre assured Doocy that the president and vice president were on good terms, claiming that "they have regular lunches" and "meet and talk regularly."
"Why would you call it awkward?" she asked again.
"So there's no weirdness about the way that things have unfolded since the last-," Doocy responded.
"Did you see them together yesterday? Did you see the show of force together?" she asked, referencing Biden and Harris honoring veterans together during the holiday Monday.
"This is, look, I'm not even going to take the premise of the question," the press secretary continued. "What I will say is the president and the vice president had lunch today. They've had lunch many times. They communicate with each other regularly. They had an opportunity to discuss the last 70 days or so of this administration—how important it is to get things done for the American people. And that's their focus. That is genuinely their focus."
TENSIONS ALLEGEDLY RISE BETWEEN BIDEN WHITE HOUSE AND HARRIS CAMPAIGN: 'TOO MUCH IN THEIR FEELINGS'
Vice President Kamala Harris delivers a concession speech after the 2024 presidential election, on Wednesday, Nov. 6, on the campus of Howard University in Washington, D.C. (AP/Jacquelyn Martin)
As Democrats pick up the pieces after President-elect Donald Trump's decisive victory, some of Harris' backers are expressing frustration that Biden's decision to continue his re-election campaign until the summer — despite long-standing concerns about his age, inflation and border security – all but sealed his party's surrender of the White House.
Biden campaigned for and endorsed Harris this cycle, but amid the roughly 100-day Harris-Walz campaign, he also made a series of mistakes that likely hurt her chances of winning the election.
Biden and Trump are set to meet on Wednesday in the White House at 11 a.m. Doocy asked if the vice president was invited, but Jean-Pierre said, "This is the norm, that the incoming president and the current president sit down in the Oval Office and have a discussion."
President Biden during the Everytown for Gun Safety "Gun Sense University" conference in Washington, D.C., on June 11. (Ken Cedeno/CNP/Bloomberg via Getty Images)
Doocy also asked if Biden would ask Trump to pardon his son Hunter, since he has pledged not to do so himself.
"I don't have anything else to share about that," she said. "I'm not going to get in, go down a rabbit hole on this. I've been very clear. The president's been very clear when we've been asked this question.
Fox News' Danielle Wallace and Emma Colton contributed to this report.
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