Members of President Joe Biden’s Democratic Party are fed up — and speaking their expletive-filled minds.
“It’s really simple: ‘Be the fucking president!,” one Democratic strategist recently said, according to The Hill. “I realize it’s tough and you’re drinking out of a fire hose every single day, but there are things you can do to control the public perception and they haven’t done any of that.”
Biden does keep stepping in it. For instance, his Food and Drug Administration (FDA) in February shut down a major baby formula producer for possible health code violations, but then the president appeared blindsided when supply dwindled, forcing parents to hunt for formula. Officials in the administration and corporate leaders have alternately said it was widely known the supply of formula would drop off, but Biden recently said he didn’t know until April.
The president has also been criticized for being slow off the mark on gas and food prices, as well as inflation in general.
“It may come down to not understanding what they’re up against — both the media environment and today’s GOP,” another Democratic strategist, Christy Setzer, said, according to The Hill. “Biden did speak out on guns, on baby formula, on inflation … but the traditional tactics aren’t breaking through, and it doesn’t seem as though they’re taking in that information, re-trenching, and trying new approaches when it’s falling flat.”
Biden has privately been whining about his press coverage. A sudden departure of a slew of press staffers followed several reports by mainstream media outlets cataloging dysfunction and turmoil in the White House.
NBC News posted a piece last week headlined, “Inside a Biden White House adrift,” which said, “Amid a rolling series of calamities and sinking approval ratings, the president’s feeling lately is that he just can’t catch a break — and that angst is rippling through his party.”
“Faced with a worsening political predicament, President Joe Biden is pressing aides for a more compelling message and a sharper strategy while bristling at how they’ve tried to stifle the plain-speaking persona that has long been one of his most potent assets,” NBC News wrote. “Biden is rattled by his sinking approval ratings and is looking to regain voters’ confidence that he can provide the sure-handed leadership he promised during the campaign, people close to the president say.”
The Washington Post piled on with a piece headlined, “White House scrambles on inflation after Biden complains to aides,” which said Biden “fumes privately that administration isn’t doing enough to show concern on high prices.”
“The White House launched a new push Tuesday to contain the political damage caused by inflation after President Biden complained for weeks to aides that his administration was not doing enough to publicly explain the fastest price increases in roughly four decades,” the Post wrote.
Biden has gone so far as “reminding his staff that he’s the one who is president,” NBC wrote.
Joseph Curl has covered politics for 35 years, including 12 years as White House correspondent for a national newspaper. He was also the a.m. editor of the Drudge Report for four years. Send tips to [email protected] and follow him on Twitter @josephcurl.