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At the end of the press conference in Geneva, Biden clashes with a journalist
Photo: PETER KLAUNZER / AFP
Journalists in the US are used to being attacked by Donald Trump after four years in the highest office. After the meeting with the Russian President Vladimir Putin, the new US President Joe Biden has now also verbally attacked a journalist. "If you don't understand, you're in the wrong job," Biden said after a brief exchange of blows with CNN's Kaitlin Collins. In the meantime, however, Biden has apologized. "I shouldn't have been such a know-it-all about the last answer," he said.
Biden met with Putin in Geneva on Wednesday. The two politicians then gave separate press conferences. Biden had already left the lectern when Collins quickly asked a few questions. She wanted to know why, after meeting Putin, Biden was so confident that he would change his behavior. After all, Putin denied involvement in cyber attacks, downplayed human rights violations and did not even name the imprisoned Kremlin critic Alexei Navalny. "How can that mean a constructive meeting?" Asked the journalist. With a raised forefinger, Biden approached the journalist and reprimanded her for never saying he was confident. After a brief exchange of blows, Biden said, “If you don't understand, you're in the wrong job.“Then he left the press conference.
Biden appeared unsupervised and instructive; on his US late-night show, entertainer Stephen Colbert scoffed at Biden's “grandpa attitude”.
Biden misses "positive" questions
When he apologized, Biden later complained that journalists would never ask him "positive" questions.
"It seems to me that to be a good reporter you have to have a negative view of life," Biden said.
Collins called Biden's attack "completely unnecessary."
She was just doing her job.
"Asking the president a question doesn't mean there is a negative or a positive trend," she said.
"It's just a way of understanding the president's point of view." Biden didn't have to apologize to her afterwards - even though she was pleased.
Biden's predecessor, Donald Trump, had violently attacked journalists on several occasions and canceled press conferences if he did not like the questions.
At his first press conference as US President-elect in 2017, he said to CNN reporter Jim Acosta: "I will not allow your question, you are fake news." Trump did not apologize.
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