I feel like State Department Spokesperson Ned Price is becoming the new ‘Jim Acosta’ in the sense that he’s been beaten down…by the Associated Press. The scenario is different as are the roles in this scene, but Price, like Acosta, has been taken to the woodshed multiple times by folks the Biden folks probably thought were on their side. In this episode of Biden administration beatdown, Price took haymakers from Associated Press’ Matt Lee over Ukraine.
To recap, we’re deploying a few thousand troops to the region. Biden said an invasion was incoming, but our response would depend on the size of the incursion, which his communications team had to clean up. President Depends seemed to have given Putin a green light to invade. NBC’s Savannah Guthrie grilled Vice President Kamala Harris about it on The Today Show. Harris did not fare well in this softball interview. Then, Biden called the Ukrainian president, said Kyiv was about to be sacked like Rome which led to the Ukrainians telling us to calm the hell down. We sent the order to evacuate our people out of there. The European Union did not, looking at us like we’re itching for war. Maybe we are—Biden has a lot of crises that he can’t manage and they’re killing his approval ratings.
Leah wrote up Lee and Price’s earlier clash when the former shredded the narrative that the world was united against Russia in this situation. Last year, Lee has trashed the State Department for their lies about Trump’s past international agreements, and for taking credit for foreign policy successes grounded in Trump-era policies.
Yesterday, it was about the evidence we had which pointed to Russia trying to launch a false flag operation to justify a Ukrainian invasion. Lee sharpened his knives and did damage (via RealClearPolitics):
Associated Press reporter Matt Lee and others at Thursday's briefing failed to get evidence for the Biden administration's claim that Russia is planning a "false flag" event to justify an invasion of Ukraine from State Department Spokesman Ned Price.
Matt Lee asked: "You said 'actions such as these suggest otherwise,' meaning they are not going to go ahead with talks. What actions are you talking about?"
"The fact that Russia continues to engage in disinformation," Ned Price said.
"You've made an allegation that they might do that. Have they actually done it?"
"What we know is what I just said. They've engaged in this activity."
"Hold on a second," the reporter said. "What activity? What activity? ... Made what report public?"
"We told you a few weeks ago we have information indicating Russia has also already pre-positioned a group of operatives to conduct a false flag operation in Eastern Ukraine. That is an action, to your question Matt."
"No, it is an action that you say they have taken, but you have shown no evidence to confirm that. And I'm going to get to the next question, which is: What is the evidence? I mean, this is like -- Crisis actors? Really? This is like Alex Jones territory you're getting into. What evidence do you have to support the idea that there is some propaganda film in the making?"
Oh man, that is straight fire. Lee didn’t stop there. He simply wanted to hear the evidence, which Price said he had just outlined. That wasn’t going to cut it.
“I would like to see some proof that you can show that shows that the Russians are doing this,” Lee added. “I remember WMDs in Iraq. And I remember you saying that Kabul is not going to fall. I remember a lot of things.”
Yikes.