(Headline USA) The White House continues to refuse to release visitor logs from President Joe Biden’s Delaware residence, despite the fact that he spent more than a quarter of his first year in office there.
When asked whether the White House would reconsider its decision not to release the information about who has visited Biden in Delaware, White House press secretary Jen Psaki insisted that such information wasn’t necessary.
“Well, the president goes to Delaware because it’s his home,” she said. “It’s also where his son and his former wife are buried. And it’s a place that is obviously close to his heart.
“A lot of presidents go visit their home when they are president,” Psaki deflected. “We also have gone a step further than the prior administration, and many administrations, in releasing visitor logs of people who visit the White House and will continue to do that.”
Biden promised during his inauguration address that he would lead the most transparent administration yet, but he has given fewer interviews and held fewer press conferences than any of his past five predecessors.
“Generally speaking, the American people have a right to know what the president is up to,” Judicial Watch President Tom Fitton, who has been fighting to make Biden’s visitor logs public, said in a statement.
“This president specifically changed policy to presumably disclose who’s been visiting the White House,” he said. “The decision to keep secret who is visiting Delaware makes a mockery of that transparency. It turns it into a joke.”
Biden has spent more than 100 days of his first year in office in Delaware, which has cost taxpayers millions of dollars in security expenses alone.
His first 16 trips to Delaware cost the Secret Service $1.96 million in hotel rooms and rental cars, as well as airfare and train tickets. The other nine trips that had not yet been included will likely push that total to $3 million.
The total cost is probably much higher than that — the Pentagon has not released the costs for using Air Force One and Marine One during these trips.