Get out!
President Joe Biden used the long arm of the executive to brush a bug off his questioner during a Weather Channel interview at the rim of the Grand Canyon.
Biden made the gesture in an interview where he was pressured by meteorologist Stephanie Abrams about his actions to combat climate change.
“You’ve got a bug on you,” Biden told her, chasing the bug away from her chest and shoulder in the middle of the interview.
‘Thank you. Appreciate it,’ Abrams told him she continued with her questions.
Abrams pressed Biden why he had not yet declared a “national emergency” regarding climate change, something some Democrats in Congress want him to do.
Pest control: President Joe Biden shot a bug off the chest/shoulder of Weather Channel interviewer Stephanie Abrams at the rim of the Grand Canyon
“I already did,” he told her. “Nationally, we have retained more land, we moved in to rejoin the Paris climate agreement. We passed the $360 billion climate control facility. We are moving. It’s the existential threat.’
“So you’ve already declared that a national emergency?” Abrams questioned him.
‘Well, practically speaking. Yes,” Biden replied. The Weather Channel said later on the air that Biden had indeed not declared such an emergency. He got the pushback despite being mocked for allowing the interview in the first place.
The insect encroachment was a return to form for Biden, who was forced to apologize early in his 2016 campaign for some of his gestures that women said made them uncomfortable.
It came on a trip where he announced where Biden was using executive power to designate a new national monument for the greater Grand Canyon, drawing a push from Native American tribes.
Biden was criticized for scheduling the interview, in which he discussed his climate and environmental agenda. He’s had relatively few sit-downs at major networks, newspapers, and online outlets
Feature, not a bug: Biden waived the bug while answering questions about climate change
President Joe Biden views the South Rim of the Grand Canyon in Grand Canyon National Park, Tuesday, August 8. He pinpoints new countries for protection, touts his climate agenda and repels insects from a Weather Channel interviewer
The interview came on a journey that saw Biden designate an area around the Grand Canyon as a national monument
If not destroyed, the designation would preserve about 1,562 square miles of land on either side of Grand Canyon National Park, and an area that supports wildlife and a variety of plants, including rare cacti.
Biden made an odd comment about the Grand Canyon on Tuesday, calling it one of the “Nine Wonders of the Ancient World.”
He soon corrected himself and said it was one of the seven miracles, although the reality is a bit more complicated. It is included in lists of seven natural wonders of the world.
Arizona Governor Katie Hobbs called Tuesday that the Grand Canyon is “known as one of the seven natural wonders of the world, but we know it for so much more.”
“There is no national treasure, none, greater than the Grand Canyon,” the president said.
Biden was criticized by his critics for giving a rare one-on-one interview to the Weather Channel, at a time when the Hunter Biden scandal was simmering.
Republicans in Congress want to examine the plea deal he worked out with prosecutors last month.
The interview comes days after his friend and former business partner Devon Archer testified during closed-door testimony that the older Biden, 80, often joined in business conversations with his son. He insisted, however, that they were mostly casual conversations about things like the weather.
Biden also used Tuesday’s event to attack “MAGA extremists” for opposing the Inflation Reduction Act.
“People, these are investments in our planet, our people, in America itself: protecting our treasures, making our country more resilient,” he said. “But some MAGA extremists in Congress are trying to undo it all. I got no help from the guys on the other team. Every single, lone person voted against this historic investment in clean energy. And now many of them are again trying to withdraw these parts of the bills, but we do not allow them. Too much is at stake.’