Joe Biden had a visitor at the White House yesterday in the person of British Prime Minister Boris Johnson. (Johnson was already over on this side of the pond for the big United Nations conference.) The meeting seemed to go well enough without much of interest taking place, but things took a turn for the “bizarre,” as one reporter described it, when it came time for questions from the press. A couple of British reporters were called on and they asked questions of BoJo, which he answered. But then, when the American reporters wanted their turn and tried to ask questions of Joe Biden, they were literally shouted down by Biden’s aides and escorted from the room. (Fox News)

Reporters faced a bizarre scenario on Tuesday as White House aides shouted down their attempts to ask President Biden questions during an Oval Office meeting.

Biden met with U.K. Prime Minister Boris Johnson at the White House, where the two discussed an array of issues. Johnson took several questions, but when Biden was asked questions, White House aides promptly escorted reporters out of the Oval Office…

Several other reporters aired their grievances and called out the White House over its behavior.

Washington Post reporter Seung Min Kim described the situation as “Not good, folks.”

Ed O’Keefe of CBS News came the closest to getting off a question for Biden, but it didn’t go well at all.

IN THE OVAL OFFICE… @POTUS Biden and British PM @BorisJohnson meet to discuss pandemic, trade and other issues. Johnson took 3 questions. White House aides shouted down U.S. attempts to ask questions. I asked Biden about southern border and we couldn’t decipher what he said. pic.twitter.com/A86kgdfsuc

— Ed O'Keefe (@edokeefe) September 21, 2021

The rest of the press corps wasn’t taking this treatment any better.

White House colleagues might be interested to know the British press thought aides shouting was totally out of order. An unwelcome lack of accountability… https://t.co/HZMBFUCgkA

— Pippa Crerar (@PippaCrerar) September 21, 2021

A formal complaint was filed with Jen Psaki, who claimed that she was unaware that an “incident” had taken place, but insisted that Biden takes questions “several times” per week. That answer wasn’t satisfying anyone either.

Is this just the “new normal” at the White House under Joe Biden and is this all we can expect for the rest of his time in office? We’ve already heard the stories about how his aides are terrified every time it looks like he might start taking questions and freestyling. Even Chuck Todd has raised questions about his “credibility” at this point, though to be fair, Todd was talking more about his failure to deliver on his promises and his poor performance with the Afghanistan withdrawal than any issues of mental competency. But no matter how well he’s been prepped, there always seem to be slip-ups. You remember “good old what’s his name” from the other day, right?

But yesterday’s performance goes well beyond the occasional senior moment and it involves the entire staff at the White House, not just Biden himself. This was a scripted, prepared event involving a meeting with another world leader and the press had been specifically invited to attend. The press was also allowed to participate when the Prime Minister was ready to take questions. But as soon as the first question for Biden began, his stiff was actually yelling at them to leave and ensuring that nobody could hear his answer.

How frightened are the people in Biden’s inner circle that they have to act in this fashion? They must know that there is something very wrong when the leader of the free world can’t be trusted to take a simple question on current events from a reporter. Don’t they have an obligation to the country to say something if that’s the case? If they don’t want to go public and make the boss look bad, it seems as if they should at least be consulting with Kamala Harris and asking if she shouldn’t be holding a private meeting with the cabinet to discuss some possible 25th Amendment action.

There’s nothing normal about what we’re seeing. Something’s not right in the Oval Office and the President is responsible for too many lives and too many decisions that literally impact the entire world to leave everyone wondering if the lights are on in Biden World, but nobody is home.