Psaki lets the sarcasm fly after reporter worries about Jan 6 doc release
Last week, President Biden declined Donald Trump’s ludicrous request to shield documents related to the January 6th insurrection from the Congressional committee investigating the tragic events of that day.
The White House rightfully stated that “President Biden has determined that an assertion of executive privilege is not in the best interests of the United States, and therefore is not justified as to any of the documents.” In short, the Biden administration agrees with the belief held by many Americans that we are entitled to know exactly what happened on January 6th and what role Trump and his confederates played in all of it.
Today, Press Secretary Jen Psaki was asked about Biden’s decision last week.
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“I know you’ve spoken to the decision by the White House counsel’s office to tell the archives ‘hand over those documents,'” said Ed O’Keefe of CBS News. “Has there been any concern or conversation about what might happen one day when the shoe’s on the other foot? And if another administration of the other party comes in and says there’s an extraordinary circumstance and they want to hand over documents that were deemed privileged by the Biden administration?”
“I can assure that this president has no intention to lead an insurrection on our nation’s Capitol,” responded Psaki.
“I anticipated that would be your answer almost word for word,” responded O’Keefe.
“Oh good,” said Psaki.
“I mean you can understand that you’re opening potentially a Pandora’s box here by setting this precedent,” said O’Keefe.
“Actually we don’t see it that way,” said Psaki. “I understand why you’re asking this question. We talked about this a little last week as well. I think it is ultimately important for people to understand and remember that January 6th was an incredibly dark day, one of the darkest days in our democracy. There was an insurrection on our nation’s Capitol.”
“What we’re talking about here is getting to the bottom of that,” Psaki went on. “Shouldn’t everyone want to get to the bottom of that? Democrats, Republicans, people who have no political affiliation whatsoever?”
“I will reiterate that we’re going to access and review as is standard in the process, the documents and any efforts to exert executive on a case-by-case basis,” she continued. “And we’ll provide you updates on those as those processes proceed and we will continue—as it relates to executive privilege for other issues—to evaluate that on a case-by-case basis as every White House has in the past. But I think if you look back at past presidents, Democratic and Republican, there isn’t really a precedent for what we’re talking about with this select committee and what they’re trying to get to the bottom of, and the uniqueness of that I think is important context.”
Watch below.
"I can assure you this president has no intention to lead an insurrection on our nation's Capitol" — Jen Psaki to Ed O'Keefe pic.twitter.com/8bhnA8DNpw
— Aaron Rupar (@atrupar) October 14, 2021
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