White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre deflected questions Wednesday about President Biden’s steadfast refusal to speak about the anti-Israel protests that have roiled college campuses for over a week.
Mr. Biden hasn’t addressed the chaos at universities across the nation since April 22, when deemed the actions of the demonstrators as “antisemitic” but also criticized those who didn’t empathize with the suffering of those living in Gaza.
On Tuesday, the White House issued a statement condemning the chaos, but it was attributed to an administration spokesperson rather than the president.
When pressed about Mr. Biden’s silence on the issue, Ms. Jean-Pierre pivoted to discuss the president’s efforts to combat antisemitism.
“The president has not been silent on this issue when it comes to antisemitism,” she said. “We’ve been clear — taking more than a hundred actions to deal with antisemitism — no one has ever done that before. Not any other administration.”
Later, she added that it was important that students and communities “feel safe” and that the administration was “going to be really forceful and underscore antisemitism is hateful speech.”
Ms. Jean-Pierre said Mr. Biden has been “kept regularly updated” on the campus protests and that he and his team were monitoring the situation.
She also condemned the seizure of campus buildings, saying such tactics were “not peaceful.”
“What we’re seeing is a small percentage of students. That’s what we’re seeing. They should not be able to disrupt the academic experience that students have,” she said.
She did not answer questions about whether outside agitators were contributing to the chaos, saying that was something for local law enforcement to address.
“That is something that I can’t speak to, at this time,” she said.
• Jeff Mordock can be reached at jmordock@washingtontimes.com.
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