(Molly Bruns, Headline USA) In a press briefing at the White House on Tuesday, Today News Africa reporter Simon Ateba slammed press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre for her apparent inability to answer questions concerning President Joe Biden’s recently discovered library of classified documents.
Today was another crazy day in the White House briefing room. With @PressSec Karine Jean-Pierre no longer providing any answers to even basic questions on classified documents, I asked her whether she was still a good fit for the job. It's sad what's going on. pic.twitter.com/zCU1gSeK5E
— Simon Ateba (@simonateba) January 24, 2023
“Karine,” Ateba said. “Since you don’t have any answer on the classified documents, you don’t seem a good fit for this job”
Jean-Pierre ignored him and took a different question from another reporter, as reported by the Post Millennial.
“We do not seem to have any answer from you,” Ateba then added.
Journalists attempting to write stories about the Biden document scandal are reaching their boiling point as Jean-Pierre continues to dodge questions, redirect their questions to bureaucratic stooges and only give the vaguest of answers.
Information about the documents, some of which were found in Biden’s personal home, is slowly making its way out of the White House. Recent information suggests that the administration is working with the Department of Justice to lock up the details of the scandal.
A report from the Washington Post indicated that Biden “was hoping for a speedy inquiry that would find no intentional mishandling of the documents, planning to disclose the matter only until after Justice issued its all clear.”
Ateba has fought it out with Jean-Pierre before, refusing to allow her to brush off his questions on breaking news.
Notably, he also derailed former press secretary Jen Psaki’s final press conference by talking over two other reporters. The White House Correspondents’ Association threatened to expel him in an official letter over the incident.
Ateba said trying to get information from the White House briefings is a “nightmare” in an interview with Tucker Carlson.
“It’s been really hard covering the White House,” Ateba explained. “It’s been hell and I don’t know how I was able to sustain my strength.”
He suspects that Jean-Pierre may be discriminating against him and other African reporters.
“I’m an immigrant, and I ask tough questions,” Ateba stated as possible reasons why Jean-Pierre has ignored him.
Ateba’s abrasive interview tactics echo those used by many in the mainstream media during the Trump administration, when reporters like CNN’s Jim Acosta and Playboy‘s Brian Karem frequently disrupted officials and created an unruly atmosphere, prompting then-press secrataries Sarah Huckabee Sanders and Kayleigh McEnany to threaten expulsion.
I’ve just been denied entrance to the WH. Secret Service just informed me I cannot enter the WH grounds for my 8pm hit
— Jim Acosta (@Acosta) November 8, 2018
After Acosta had his press pass revoked for his disrespectful demeanor, CNN successfully sued to have it reinstated.
