Fox correspondent Peter Doocy will remain known for his inane questions asked in the White House briefing room throughout the Biden administration.
Doocy asked White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre this Monday about Novak Djokovic, a professional tennis player who ended up not playing in this year’s U.S. Open due to demands that most foreign travelers entering the U.S. show they were vaccinated against COVID-19. (Djokovic didn’t receive the vaccination.) Sure, Americans are struggling with easily perceptible real-world threats: potential natural disasters as hurricane season heats up, economic pressures (with the Biden administration rolling out policies to help everyday folks), and potential political violence from Trump supporters, one of whom recently tried to force his way into an FBI office and was shot and killed by police after a lengthy stand-off. Nevertheless, Doocy was concerned about Djokovic.
After Jean-Pierre initially resisted discussing hyper-specific details of the case due to privacy concerns, Doocy asked: “Somebody unvaccinated comes over on a plane; you say that’s not okay. Somebody walks into Texas or Arizona unvaccinated; they’re allowed to stay. Why?”
After some back-and-forth, Jean-Pierre ripped into Doocy’s argument, which seemingly hinged on an unrealistic idea that folks are just walking into border states like Texas and Arizona without meaningfully swift push-back. “So let me just lay out what we have done under this administration,” the press secretary remarked. “We have installed new border technology and set up joint protocols with Mexico and Guatemala to catch more human traffickers. We have already made over 3,000 arrests in the first three months of launching an unprecedented anti-smuggling campaign with regional partners. We’ve secured record levels of funding for the Department of Homeland Security. We’ve put in place dedicated immigration judges so asylum seekers can have their cases heard faster. We’ve expanded labor pathways, including H-2B visas. And through the Los Angeles Declaration on Migration and Protection, President Biden brought 20 leaders — world leaders together to manage increased migration flows across the Western Hemisphere.”
That’s not all. “By contrast, core to the prior administration, immigration strategy was to build a wall and they couldn’t even come accomplish that in the four years,” the Biden official added Monday. “And they also, by talking about building a wall — which would have taken billions of dollars from veterans… — which is also a policy that just does not work. It is not that simple. It’s not just that people are walking across the border. We have a plan in place. This is not like switching the lights on. Right? This is going to take a process. We are fixing a broken system that was actually left by the last administration. And as it relates to the tennis star, that is totally different. That is a different process. That is the U.S. Open that he is part of, and there [is] CDC — federal guidance he needs to follow.”
Doocy brought up Title 42, referring to provisions by which migrants have been expelled on pandemic-related grounds, and he claimed Biden’s administration “got rid of it.” It’s actually still in place after Republican officials who were pushing for keeping it prevailed in court. “Title 42 is very much in place, and that is the process,” Jean-Pierre commented Monday. “So there is a CDC provision for folks coming through the southern border. It is not just for tennis players. Migrants have, also, a CDC guidance that we have to follow, which is Title 42. So that is not the case. That is factually wrong.” Watch some of the Monday exchange between the two below:
White House Press Sec. Karine Jean-Pierre corrects Peter Doocy's claim that the Biden administration lifted Title 42:
"That is not the case. That is factually wrong." pic.twitter.com/GfjMQkEkCh
— The Recount (@therecount) August 29, 2022
