Biden names Jen Psaki as White House press secretary as part of all female communications team

Danielle Zoellner
·1 min read
(Independent)
(Independent)

Joe Biden has hired an all-female communications team for his administration, including naming veteran Democratic spokeswoman Jen Psaki as his White House press secretary.

Ms Psaki will be one of seven women to fill the upper ranks of Mr Biden’s communications team, making it the first of its kind where all top aides tasked with speaking for a presidential administration will be female.

“Honored to work again for @JoeBiden, a man I worked on behalf of during the Obama-Biden Admin as he helped lead economic recovery, rebuilt our relationships with partners (turns out good practice) and injected empathy and humanity into nearly every meeting I sat in,” Ms Psaki tweeted on Sunday following the announcement.

Mr Biden’s press team will be led by Kate Bedingfield, who has worked as the president-elect’s campaign communications manager. She will retain the same title under the Biden administration.

“Communicating directly and truthfully to the American people is one of the most important duties of a President, and this team will be entrusted with the tremendous responsibility of connecting the American people to the White House,” Mr Biden said in a statement.

“These qualified, experienced communicators bring diverse perspectives to their work and a shared commitment to building this country back better,” he added.

More follows …

Latest Stories

  • Trump said world leaders complained to him about the election results — but most of them have already congratulated Biden

    Even world leaders who have previously allied with Trump — including UK's Boris Johnson and Israel's Benjamin Netanyahu — have congratulated Biden.

  • In El Salvador, arrested gang members paraded for the cameras

    Hundreds of handcuffed Salvadoran gang members were displayed before assembled reporters on Saturday, a vivid show of President Nayib Bukele's policy of confronting them and the violent crime they are accused of committing. In April, Bukele provoked the ire of rights groups when he published on social media jarring pictures of hundreds of semi-naked jailed gang members, pressed tightly together in rows, despite the raging pandemic. Security Minister Rogelio Rivas called the majority of the newly-detained "terrorists" in remarks after they were assembled in an open-air plaza by heavily-armed soldiers, nearly all the detainees wearing masks and with their faces, many tattooed, looking down.

  • Swedish government sidelines epidemiologist who steered country's no lockdown experiment as deaths rise

    The high-profile epidemiologist who led Sweden's no lock-down strategy in the spring appears to be being sidelined by the government after his prediction that greater immunity would mean a lighter second wave proved badly wrong. Anders Tegnell's biweekly press conference was on Thursday pushed into the shade by an overlapping press conference fronted by Sweden's Prime Minister Stefan Lofven, where new scenarios prepared by the Public Health Agency were announced. "There's certainly a split, and I'm pretty sure that many in the government have rather lost faith in the Public Health Agency," said Nicholas Aylott, an associate politics professor at Stockholm's Södertorn University. "By some counts, we've now got exactly the same level of spread of the virus that we had in the spring, and that's about as clear a refutation of Tegnell's strategy as you could wish for." Dr Tegnell has always insisted that his Public Health Agency has never pursued a herd immunity strategy, but he repeatedly suggested in the summer that his counterparts in Norway, Finland and Denmark would face a tougher task over the winter because of lower levels of immunity in their populations. This month, though, the number of deaths in Sweden has again begun to soar above that of its Nordic neighbours, with 630 deaths so far registered as a result of Covid-19. That is about ten times the per capita death rate in Norway -- where just 30 Covid-19 deaths were registered between October 28th and November 25th.

  • Iran newspaper: Strike Haifa if Israel killed scientist

    An opinion piece published Sunday by a hard-line Iranian newspaper urged Iran to attack the Israeli port city of Haifa if Israel carried out the killing of the scientist who founded the Islamic Republic’s military nuclear program in the early 2000s. Israel, suspected of killing Iranian nuclear scientists over the past decade, has not commented on the brazen slaying of Mohsen Fakhrizadeh.

  • South Dakota's governor encouraged people to go shopping the same day the state reported its highest single-day COVID-19 death total

    Noem, a Republican, has refused calls to issue a mask mandate, disputing their effectiveness even as cases in South Dakota surge.

  • Trump promises continued election fight as Biden makes key appointments

    President Donald Trump questioned on Sunday whether the Supreme Court would ever hear a case airing his unproven allegations of widespread election fraud, as President-elect Joe Biden named more officials for leading roles in his new administration. Although Trump pledged to continue his legal fight to overturn the Nov. 3 election, his comments in a Fox News telephone interview suggested the Republican president was growing resigned to the fact that his Democratic opponent will move into the White House on Jan. 20. Trump's team was dealt another blow with the completion on Sunday of recounts in Wisconsin's two largest counties that confirmed Biden won the hotly contested state by more than 20,000 votes.

  • Harvey Weinstein's ex-wives succeed in freezing £4.5 million of his assets

    Harvey Weinstein's appeal against his rape and assault convictions has been hampered after the disgraced former movie mogul's two ex-wives reportedly froze £4.5 million of his remaining assets. Weinstein, who was given a 23-year jail term at a court hearing in New York in March after being convicted of rape and sexual assault, is allegedly no longer able to pay the lawyers working on his appeal. Weinstein's two ex-wives, Eve Chilton, whom he divorced in 2004, and Georgina Chapman, a British fashion designer who left the producer after assault allegations against him emerged in 2017, have reportedly taken legal action to freeze his accounts. According to the Daily Mail, the pair filed a motion in April raising concerns over the state of Weinstein's finances and provided evidence in July in the form of private jet receipts and expenses related to his criminal trial. The two women also reportedly provided the court with evidence of large deposits that had been made into Weinstein’s bank account as well as proof of insurance fees he was set to collect.

  • Teen brothers killed in shooting at Sacramento, Calif. mall

    A shooting at a shopping mall in Sacramento, California Friday has left two teenage brothers dead. As reported by KCRA-TV, the victims were identified as 19-year-old Dewayne Reed, who was pronounced dead at the scene, and 17-year-old Sa’Quan Reed, who died at a local hospital. The shooting reportedly happened around 6: p.m. Friday at Arden Fair Mall.

  • Turkey's new virus figures confirm experts' worst fears

    When Turkey changed the way it reports daily COVID-19 infections, it confirmed what medical groups and opposition parties have long suspected — that the country is faced with an alarming surge of cases that is fast exhausting the Turkish health system. In an about-face, President Recep Tayyip Erdogan’s government this week resumed reporting all positive coronavirus tests — not just the number of patients being treated for symptoms — pushing the number of daily cases to above 30,000. No country can report exact numbers on the spread of the disease since many asymptomatic cases go undetected, but the previous way of counting made Turkey look relatively well-off in international comparisons, with daily new cases far below those reported in European countries including Italy, Britain and France.

  • The Trump campaign wound up spending $3 million to increase Biden's lead in Wisconsin

    That seemingly didn't go according to plan.President-elect Joe Biden picked up 257 votes in Wisconsin's Milwaukee County on Friday after the Trump campaign demanded a recount there. President Trump did pick up some votes, as well, but the 125 he received gives Biden a net gain of 132.Biden won Wisconsin by around 20,000 votes, which was close enough for the Trump campaign to call for recounts, and a separate one in Dane County is expected to finish Sunday, so the president could still decrease his deficit. But Dane County is also Democratic-leaning, so it's unlikely the recount will significantly alter the results either way.The Trump campaign's efforts, which are grounded in unfounded claims of widespread voter fraud, cost $3 million.Trump's lawyers are still expected to mount a legal challenge of the overall vote in Wisconsin, The Guardian notes, but the state is on track to certify its results Tuesday. Read more at The Guardian and Business Insider.More stories from theweek.com Is Mnuchin trying to sabotage the economy? Trump: 'I'm ashamed I endorsed' Georgia Gov. Brian Kemp The vaccine breakthrough

  • Ethiopian military retakes Tigray, says PM, but explosions reported in Eritrean capital

    Ethiopia’s Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed has declared military operations in the country’s northern Tigray region “completed’ and claimed that his federal forces had captured the crucial regional capital of Mekele. Due to an almost complete communications black out in Tigray, it was impossible to independently verify his statement. The announcement on Saturday night came just hours before at least six rockets from northern Tigray hit Eritrea, according to diplomats, suggesting the prime minister's claims were premature. Catastrophic fighting was expected over the weekend in Mekele when the Ethiopian army said it was surrounding the city of half a million people with tanks and artillery and warned civilians to stay inside. International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) staff visited government-run Ayder Referral Hospital yesterday, where they said approximately 80 per cent of patients were suffering from trauma injuries and basic supplies were dwindling. "The hospital is running dangerously low on sutures, antibiotics, anticoagulants, painkillers, and even gloves," said Maria Soledad, ICRC’s head of operations in Ethiopia. It is thought that forces loyal to the powerful regional government, the Tigray People's Liberation Front (TPLF), may have tactically retreated into the nearby mountains days ago to avoid heavy clashes. The TPLF is thought to command as many as 200,000 fighters, some of whom fought in the bloody Eritrea-Ethiopia war from 1998 to 2000. Because of these old hostilities with neighbouring Eritrea, Tigray is home to some of the largest stores of weapons in the country. The US embassy in the Eritrean capital Asmara reported early Sunday “six explosions” caused by rockets from Tigray region had occurred in the city “at about 10:13 pm” on Saturday night. The strikes marked the third time that Asmara has been shot at since fighting began on November 4. The TPLF has only claimed responsibility for the first rocket attack two weeks ago but has frequently accused Eritrea of siding with Ethiopian federal forces. Eritrea, Africa’s most totalitarian state, has not commented on the strikes. The conflict began when Mr Abiy, last year’s Nobel Peace Prize winner, announced that he was sending federal troops into Tigray in response to attacks by pro-TPLF forces on national army camps. The move marked a dramatic escalation of tensions between the federal government and the TPLF, which dominated Ethiopian politics for nearly three decades before anti-government protests swept Mr Abiy to office in 2018. Thousands have died in the conflict so far, with tens of thousands of refugees streaming across the border into Sudan. Each side has accused the other of grave crimes and mass killings.

  • Mother of slain Florida teen shot during burial service

    An unknown gunman fired into a crowd gathered at a Saturday afternoon burial service of a teenager who was fatally shot by a Florida sheriff's deputy earlier this month, officials said. The shooting happened as guests gathered at Riverview Memorial Gardens to pay their respects to 18-year-old Sincere Pierce. Pierce and 16-year-old Angelo Crooms were killed Nov. 13 by a Brevard County Sheriff's deputy.

  • Armenians rally for soldiers missing in Karabakh fighting

    A thousand people took to the streets of the Armenian capital Yerevan on Sunday demanding the authorities take action to find soldiers missing in recent fighting with Azerbaijan over Nagorno-Karabakh.

  • Thousands flee erupting Indonesian volcano

    Indonesia has nearly 130 active volcanoes, more than any other country, and while many show high levels of activity it can be weeks or even months before an eruption. Raditya Jati, a spokesman for the agency, said in a statement that the eruption from the Mt. Ile Lewotolok volcano had caused panic among those living nearby. Muhammad Ilham, a 17-year-old who witnessed the eruption, told Reuters that resident nearby were "panicked and they're still looking for refuge and in need of money right now". Indonesia's Volcanology and Geological Hazard Mitigation Centre said on its website that the area near the volcano is likely to be inundated with "hot clouds, lava stream, lava avalanche, and poisonous gas".

  • Britain urged to probe wealth of Russian family whose son had 'world’s most expensive wedding'

    It was perhaps the world’s most expensive wedding; an extravaganza costing tens of millions of pounds with performances by Jennifer Lopez, Sting and Enrique Iglesias, a fleet of Rolls Royces to ferry the guests and a 20-year-old bride wearing a $1m dress and a $5m crown. The groom, Said Gutseriev, had grown up in London and been educated at Harrow School and at Oxford, and his father - one of Russia’s wealthiest oligarchs - could not have been prouder.

  • Obama's former top economist says Democrats should accept a smaller stimulus package now and try to pass a larger relief plan later

    Congress has been gridlocked on another coronavirus relief plan since the spring, and Democrats have been pushing for a larger package for months.

  • Mexico charges ex-security chief who faces trial in US

    Mexican officials said Sunday they want to prosecute former security chief Genaro Gará Luna in his own country, despite the fact he faces trial in the U.S. for allegedly protecting a drug gang. The action follows a U.S. decision to drop charges against another former top Mexican official accused of drug links, ex-Defense Secretary Salvador Cienfuegos, and leave any prosecution up to Mexico. A federal official told The Associated Press on Sunday that the Attorney General's Office had issued an arrest warrant on Friday for former Public Security Secretary García Luna and that officials “are assessing the viability of starting an extradition process.”

  • A Few of Our Favorite Small Businesses Running Sales This Weekend

    It's #smallbusinesssaturday, and you know what that meansOriginally Appeared on Architectural Digest

  • New York City public schools will begin to reopen with weekly COVID-19 testing

    New York City's public schools will begin to reopen for in-person learning on Dec. 7, starting with elementary schools for students whose parents agree to a weekly testing regimen for the novel coronavirus, Mayor Bill de Blasio announced on Sunday. The schools, which make up the country's largest school system, were closed less than two weeks ago after the citywide rate of coronavirus tests coming back positive exceeded a 3% benchmark agreed to by the mayor and the teachers' union. "It's a new approach because we have so much proof now of how safe schools can be," de Blasio told reporters, saying the 3% benchmark was being scrapped and pointing to research that shows young children appear to be less vulnerable to COVID-19.

  • Trump: 'I'm ashamed I endorsed' Georgia Gov. Brian Kemp

    In his first one-on-one interview since the general election, President Trump told Fox News' Maria Bartiromo over the phone that he is "ashamed" he once endorsed Georgia Gov. Brian Kemp (R).Trump, who throughout the interview repeated allegations of widespread voter fraud without evidence or much pushback from Bartiromo, complained about Georgia's electoral process in particular. The president became the first Republican presidential candidate to lose the state since 1992. He has already sought a mostly ineffective recount, but he's still fuming over his defeat, and he's taken out his anger on state officials, especially Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger. But he let Kemp have it Sunday.Trump said Kemp has "done absolutely nothing" to assist his efforts to flip the results and admitted "I'm ashamed that I endorsed him."> "I'm ashamed that I endorsed him" -- Trump disses Brian Kemp for not doing more to help him steal the election in Georgia pic.twitter.com/pCgF7dFIk2> > -- Aaron Rupar (@atrupar) November 29, 2020As several observers pointed out, Kemp has traditionally been a solid supporter of the president, highlighting how quickly Trump's relationships can turn. > Kemp has been one of the president's strongest supporters from the governor's mansion, backing Trump's leadership+handling of the virus, for example. > > Now, Kemp and SoS Raffensperger are getting thrown under the bus because Trump lost GA (but other Republicans did well!) https://t.co/SwB6ff5tpr> > -- stephen fowler covers Georgia's election! (@stphnfwlr) November 29, 2020More stories from theweek.com Is Mnuchin trying to sabotage the economy? The vaccine breakthrough 5 witheringly funny cartoons about Trump's sort-of concession