Joe Biden

Veep star Julia Louis-Dreyfus was among “23 extraordinary Americans,” as Biden described them, awarded honors Tuesday in a star-studded East Room gathering. Along with Louis-Dreyfus, Bruce Springsteen, José Feliciano, the “Empress of soul” Gladys Knight, Mindy Kaling, Antonio Martorell-Cardona, Judith Francisca Baca, Fred Eychaner, Joan Shigekawa and Vera Wang, along with organizations the Billie Holiday Theatre and the International Association of Blacks in Dance, received medals.

The White House’s decision not to have President Biden sit down with a Fox News journalist for an interview during the network’s pregame coverage of this year’s Super Bowl signals a potentially frosty road ahead for Biden and the nation’s top cable news company. The two sides have given conflicting versions of what went on behind the scenes in the days before the interview, to be aired on Fox, was called off.

In the end, the White House and Fox News will both claim the high road.

A White House official said Friday evening that it was “inaccurate” to say the interview had been rescheduled, contradicting a Fox Corp. spokesperson who said earlier in the day that it was happening.

President Joe Biden will do a sit-down interview tied to the Super Bowl, but it will be done by Fox Soul, not Fox News. “After the White House reached out to Fox Soul Thursday evening, there was some initial confusion. Fox Soul looks forward to interviewing the President for Super Bowl Sunday,” Fox Corp. said in a statement Friday afternoon.

White House Press Secretary Karine Jean-Pierre said Friday that Biden had been “looking forward” to an interview with the little-known streaming service Fox Soul, but that Fox opted out. Fox did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

With just three days to go before the Kansas City Chiefs square off against the Philadelphia Eagles at State Farm Stadium in Glendale, Arizona, the White House has yet to commit to the traditional interview between the President of the United States and the news division of the media company broadcasting the gridiron classic, potentially shunning a conversation that would be seen by one of TV’s biggest audiences.

President Joe Biden took Big Tech to task, and got in a shot at cable fees, in his State of the Union speech Tuesday night, with Big Tech getting the brunt of the criticism. “The idea that cable, internet and cellphone companies can charge you $200 or more if you decide to switch to another provider — give me a break,” he said during the part of his speech when he hammered various industries — “big pharma,” airlines — over what he called “junk fees.”

President Joe Biden plans to call for stringent curbs on targeted advertising data collection in Tuesday evening’s State of the Union address. “Big Tech companies collect huge amounts of data on the things we buy, the websites we visit, and the places we go,” the White House stated in a fact sheet outlining Biden’s speech. “There should be clear and strict limits on the ability to collect, use, transfer, and maintain our personal data, especially for sensitive data such as geolocation and health information, and the burden must fall on companies — not consumers — to minimize how much information they collect.”

After two years of relative quiet, the Washington press corps mounted familiar battle stations this week as a Biden administration scandal took shape. “You’re not going to answer the questions, but we’re going to ask them because that’s our job,” Ed O’Keefe, a correspondent for CBS News, told White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre during a press briefing Wednesday in which she repeatedly refused to provide new information about classified documents that had been found improperly stored in the president’s former office space.

President Biden pushed for sweeping reforms to target tech giants through data privacy, competition and content moderation law updates in a Wall Street Journal op-ed published Wednesday. Biden’s op-ed is light on details and falls short of backing specific policy proposals, but throws the president’s weight behind several hot-button issues Big Tech critics on both sides of the aisle have raised.

President Joe Biden, who at first did not succeed in getting his FCC nominee confirmed, or even voted on the the full Senate, is try, trying again, signaling he is not giving up on Gigi Sohn. Sohn has become a contentious pick, leaving the FCC at a 2-2 political tie for longer than at any other time. The president on Jan. 3 again submitted the nomination of Sohn to be the fifth commissioner, and third Democrat, on the FCC. She has been nominated to a five-year term, but since it is retroactive to the departure of the commissioner she is replacing — Chairman Ajit Pai, whose term expired in July 2021 — it will be, at most, a three-year-plus term.

Drew Barrymore has scored President Biden’s first TV sitdown since last month’s midterm elections. Barrymore, 47, host of the syndicated Drew Barrymore Show, taped an interview with Biden and his wife, Jill, at the White House last Friday, although the program won’t air until Monday, Dec. 19.

The Biden administration declared Thursday that Saudi Arabia’s crown prince should be considered immune from a lawsuit over his role in the killing of a U.S.-based journalist, a turnaround from Joe Biden’s passionate campaign trail denunciations of Prince Mohammed bin Salman over the brutal slaying.

A newly energized President Joe Biden is sitting down with correspondent Scott Pelley for his first 60 Minutes interview since taking office as the 46th President of the United States. Pelley spoke with Biden at the White House and in Detroit — as he toured the auto show there — for a two-part report that will be broadcast on the 55th season premiere of 60 Minutes this Sunday, Sept. 18, on CBS.

Broadcast networks passed on carrying Joe Biden’s speech in Philadelphia, as the president cast MAGA Republicans as a threat to democracy. ABC ran Press Your Luck, CBS went with a Young Sheldon rerun and NBC with a Law & Order replay. CNN and MSNBC carried the address, as did news division streaming channels, but Fox News stuck with Tucker Carlson and his critique of the speech as it was happening.

The President will deliver a primetime address in Philadelphia on Thursday on the “continued battle for the soul of the nation.” The White House announced the address on Monday afternoon. The broadcast networks have yet to say whether they will pre-empt programming for the speech.

President Joe Biden said that he was “doing well” and “getting a lot of work done” in a new video posted by the White House, just hours after he tested positive for COVID. “Thanks for your concern, and keep the faith. It’s going to be OK,” Biden said in the short spot, shot on the Truman Balcony on the south side of the White House.

Jon Allsop: “It’s not uncommon for U.S. leaders to skirt press-freedom issues in choreographed encounters with foreign counterparts with questionable records in that area. But the state of threat facing Mexican journalists is hardly a faraway issue: two of the reporters killed so far this year died in Tijuana, just across the border from San Diego; in the past, Mexican journalists killed close to the US border have covered it, or lived and worked on both sides of it. And, more broadly, press freedom is uncommonly front of mind in U.S. foreign affairs right now.”

The NewsGuild-CWA is asking President Biden to urge the FCC to block the purchase of Tegna TV stations by investment fund Standard General and Apollo Global Management. The guild, the nation’s largest union representing journalists, told the President in an open letter circulated widely Thursday (June 2) that the deal “would kill journalism jobs, undermine local news and raise prices for American families.”

In a forthcoming book, a pair of New York Times reporters and CNN political analysts report that President Joe Biden “assessed” Fox News “as one of the most destructive forces in the United States.” The reporters, Jonathan Martin and Alexander Burns, say that Biden was even more critical of Fox Corp. patriarch Rupert Murdoch. According to the book, Biden told an unnamed associate in mid-2021 that Murdoch was “the most dangerous man in the world.”

President Joe Biden plans to call for new privacy laws, including one that would prohibit companies from serving behaviorally targeted ads to children. “Children are … subject to the platforms’ intensive and excessive data collection vacuum, which they use to deliver sensational and harmful content and troves of paid advertising to our kids,” the White House stated in a fact sheet outlining Biden’s State of the Union address, scheduled for Tuesday evening.

NBC Nightly News anchor Lester Holt will interview Biden in Virginia on Thursday, with excerpts to air that evening on Nightly News and Friday morning on Today. The full interview will air during the Super Bowl pregame show at an exact time to be determined. The interview will be Biden’s first of 2022, and his first formal interview since marking one year in office.

Following a meeting of the president’s Competition Council Monday, Fox News Channel’s Peter Doocy asked Biden about inflation, which is at a nearly 40-year high and has hurt the president’s public approval. Doocy called out, “Do you think inflation is a political liability ahead of the midterms?” Biden responded with sarcasm, “It’s a great asset — more inflation.” Then he shook his head and added, “What a stupid son of a bitch.”

Lawmakers say 2022 is shaping up as a pivotal year in their efforts to tighten regulations on social media and other internet platforms — and are pushing President Biden to come off the sidelines. Democrats and Republicans are working on half a dozen or more major categories of legislation dealing with online privacy and children’s safety, the transparency of companies’ data-collection practices, accountability for content posted on social media and market dominance by a handful of major players.

Biden is set to appear Friday on NBC’s The Tonight Show with comedian Jimmy Fallon. Biden will appear virtually; the White House didn’t say where he will be when he tapes the segment.

So far in his tenure, the president has given far fewer one-on-one interviews than his two predecessors. Some Democrats are asking if he could be making better use of his White House pulpit.

Republican opposition to FCC nominee Gigi Sohn could let Sens. Joe Manchin and Kyrsten Sinema decide whether President Joe Biden secures a Democratic majority at the agency.

The White House, in a bid to avert a Republican majority over the regulator, also tapped former FCC official Gigi Sohn as a commissioner.

Jessica Rosenworcel, the acting chairwoman of the powerful regulator, campaigned vigorously for a permanent appointment. If she is confirmed by the Senate, Rosenworcel would lead an agency whose responsibilities include ensuring that millions of Americans have internet access.

President Biden has yet to nominate anyone to fill a vacant seat at the FCC. What’s more, the term of current acting Chairwoman Jessica Rosenworcel is set to expire when Congress adjourns at the end of the year. It adds up to a possible Republican majority on the commission under a Democratic administration, which could stymie the party’s efforts on a number of policies, including net neutrality standards.

President Joe Biden’s failure to nominate a fifth FCC member has forced Democrats to work with a 2-2 deadlock instead of the 3-2 majority the president’s party typically enjoys at the FCC. But things could get worse for Democrats starting in January. If Biden doesn’t make his choice quickly enough to get Senate confirmation by the end of this year, Republicans could get a 2-1 FCC majority despite Democrats controlling both the White House and Senate.