This week’s White House Report Card finds President Joe Biden sitting atop a good jobs report and bragging about taking out the top Islamic State leader. But like past weeks, he is also facing polling that shows many don’t care, or aren’t giving him credit, with two putting him in “worst ever” territory.
Our graders were split, as usual. Conservative national security expert Jed Babbin found little to celebrate and lots to criticize. He gave a D- and highlighted some of the confusing messages coming from the White House.
Democratic pollster John Zogby, who for years has weighed economic news heaviest, cited the better than expected jobs creation report Friday in giving a B.
Jed Babbin
Grade D-
Because of the inane statements and commentary coming out of Biden and his crew this week, it would have been a pretty funny seven-day comedy miniseries were things not going to hell in a handbasket.
Monday began with the president saying that his administration was committed to solving the border crisis but that it was trying to figure out why illegal immigrants were coming to the United States. Biden said, “I think one of the fundamental things we’ve got to do in addition to some of the changes we’ll make, which we won’t get into it today, is that if we figure out why they’re leaving in the first place.” Maybe, just maybe, they are coming because Biden threw the gates open and welcomed them (more than 2 million last year alone) in the border crisis he created.
.@POTUS and @FLOTUS reignited the Cancer Moonshot today! Full circle moment since we first launched from OVP! We will end cancer as we know it! pic.twitter.com/Scw2Bsw6Hn
— Meghan Hays (@MegHays46) February 2, 2022
Also fun was White House spokeswoman Jen Psaki’s comments ridiculing Fox News for covering the story about how lax liberal law enforcement was creating a crime surge across the country. She said, “And then on Fox is Jeanine Pirro talking about soft-on-crime consequences. I mean, what does that even mean, right? So there’s an alternate universe on some coverage. What’s scary about it is a lot of people watch that.” Those remarks drew heavy criticism from America’s largest police union, the Fraternal Order of Police. FOP President Patrick Yoes said, “I think it’s wrong, very wrong, for Ms. Psaki to suggest that violent crime in our country is of no concern or to just laugh it off.”
On Wednesday, after Biden gave remarks to reporters, his wife had to again lead him off the stage. His diminishing mental capacity was again on display.
Last year was the greatest year of job creation in U.S. history. pic.twitter.com/3pFKuTFU8W
— President Biden (@POTUS) February 4, 2022
Biden finished the week with a visit to New York City, supposedly to help fight the surge in crime there. All Biden did was bash Republicans and gun manufacturers and call for a renewed ban on assault weapons. He also said that gun manufacturers were unique in their immunity from lawsuits. Someone ought to prepare him better. Pfizer, Moderna, and other COVID-19 vaccine manufacturers are immune from lawsuits for defects, or effects, of the vaccines. No mention of them because they’re favorites of the Democrats.
Biden said he would send about 3,000 troops to Poland and Romania (some being redeployed from Germany) as part of his “wag the dog” exercise on Ukraine. They’ll do nothing to enhance Ukrainian security, but it’ll be a time away from their families that could be better spent. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky is calling for calm while Biden is fanning the flames. A U.N. Security Council meeting, called at Biden’s request to consider the Ukraine crisis, fizzled so quietly that no one noticed.
Meanwhile, Biden’s popularity is slumping into the “worst president ever” range. All in all, a very unfunny and dismal week for Joe & Co.
John Zogby
Grade B
This was a good week for Biden.
There was very good economic news for starters. The Labor Department reported 467,000 new jobs in January, triple what economists expected. December’s report was revised to 709,000 making it a spectacular month and a total of over 6 million new jobs created in 2021, Biden’s first year in the White House.
A SEAL team took out or “encouraged” an incredibly brutal ISIS leader to take himself out. In any event, he is gone. New COVID-19 cases are down in 49 of 50 states, and the Republican National Committee acclaimed by voice vote that the horrific events of Jan. 6, 2021 were a “legitimate form of political discourse.”
And there were leaders named Jeff Zucker, Mark Zuckerberg, and Boris Johnson who had far worse weeks.
Biden’s polling numbers have not really moved just yet, but the president looks like the man in charge.
Jed Babbin is a Washington Examiner contributor and former deputy undersecretary of defense in the administration of former President George H.W. Bush. Follow him on Twitter @jedbabbin
John Zogby is the founder of the Zogby Poll and senior partner at John Zogby Strategies. His weekly podcast with son and partner Jeremy Zogby can be heard here. Follow him on Twitter @ZogbyStrategies
