OPINION: This article may contain commentary which reflects the author's opinion.
First Lady Jill Biden addressed a tough audience at the White House.
While speaking at the National Governors Association, the first lady, a retired teacher, began with an anecdote about vocational training but missed the punchline.
“As many of you know, I’ve been teaching writing for 40 years,” the first lady recalled. “So one day, a student named Harry who wanted to be an auto mechanic raised his hand. ‘Dr. B.,’ he said. ‘The only thing I need to learn how to write is, ‘NEEDS BRAKES.’”
Some members of the audience laughed too late and interrupted the first lady’s next sentence.
She hit back, “Well, you finally got it! Come on! Wake up!”
Just before she started shouting, the first lady had asked Congress to “stop the shouting” earlier in that speech. “Lawmakers on the hill,” she urged, should “turn down the volume” and “actually listen to one another.”
“You said pure partisan politics has never contributed to real solutions, and that we can and should prioritize progress over politics, especially on issues where the majority of Americans agree. That majority is an exhausted one,” the first lady told Republican Gov. Phil Scott of Vermont.
“They’re frustrated by a Congress that is often mired in gridlock and by those who too often treat governing as a sport.”
“As many of you know, I teach writing at a community college, and every semester, I start by reading a poem to my class, called, ‘Where I’m From,’ by George Ella Lyon,” she said at the time, according to the White House transcript.
“And then I say, it’s your turn! And, yes—a sheen of terror washes over many of their faces at the thought of writing their own poem. I can almost hear them internally screaming, ‘No!’ But I show them other students’ examples and we talk it through.”
WATCH:
Jill Biden is not happy when one of her jokes falls flat:
“Well, you finally got it! Come on, wake up!” pic.twitter.com/Is8sB1GSYS
— Conservative War Machine (@WarMachineRR) February 23, 2024
Last week, a damning report came out detailing how Jill Biden questioned senior aides about why they failed to stop President Joe Biden during a nearly two-hour press conference in January 2022.
“She had watched the news conference, and the look on her face told everyone in the room — from the president on down — that they had some explaining to do,” New York Times reporter Katie Rogers wrote of Jill Biden in “American Woman,” according to Axios, which obtained a copy of the book.
“Why didn’t anyone stop that?” asked the first lady, who is known as the president’s protector.
According to a new book, Jill asked: “Where were you guys? ‘Where was the person who was going to end the press conference?”
Jill Biden reportedly questioned aides about stopping a presidential press conference two years ago. This follows the release of Robert Hur’s report on President Biden’s handling of classified documents, which revealed his poor memory.
Biden has rarely held solo press conferences during his presidency, instead opting for joint press conferences with foreign leaders.
In her book, Rogers reveals that Jill Biden confronted President Biden and his aides following the Jan. 19, 2022, news conference commemorating his first year in office.
During the nearly two-hour conference, Biden discussed various issues but occasionally stumbled over facts and reacted strongly to a reporter who cited his remarks comparing political adversaries to segregationists, Fox News reported.
“She had watched the news conference, and the look on her face told everyone in the room — from the president on down — that they had some explaining to do,” Rogers wrote in the excerpt reported by Axios. “‘Why didn’t anyone stop that?’ she demanded.”
Rogers wrote that the First Lady’s hostile reaction even cowered her husband into silence.
“Everyone stayed silent, looking at one another, and then at her, and back to one another. That included the most powerful man in the world. Her husband essentially played along, not offering an answer, even though aides had slipped him a card suggesting he end the press conference,” Rogers wrote.
The reports on the book come at a challenging time for the White House, which has been grappling with concerns about the president’s advanced age.
Biden recently delivered a rare nationally televised primetime speech and press conference on Thursday night in response to alleged significant memory lapses during his interview for a special counsel report regarding his handling of classified documents.
The press conference, which did not go well, followed the release of Counsel Robert Hur’s damning report regarding Joe Biden’s mishandling of classified information.
Hur’s 388-page report, which took the White House by surprise and sent shockwaves through the administration, documented Biden’s memory loss dating back nearly a decade, which puts him in 25th Amendment territory.
“Mr. Biden will likely present himself to the jury, as he did during his interview with our office, as a sympathetic, well-meaning, elderly man with a poor memory,” Hur wrote in explaining his rationale for refusing prosecution. “…It would be difficult to convince a jury they should convict him – by then a former president who will be at least well into his eighties – of a serious felony that requires a mental state of willfulness.”
“Our investigation uncovered evidence that President Biden willfully retained and disclosed classified materials after his vice presidency when he was a private citizen,” the report said, adding that Biden also could not recall the years he served as vice president or the year his son, Beau, died of brain cancer.
