President Joe Biden is approaching the end of his first 100 days in office on Friday, and oddly enough, the arbitrary marker coupled with a noticeably progressive start to his presidency seems to have Biden’s Republican critics feeling the pressure to taint the president’s progress. Former Speaker of the House Newt Gingrich zeroed in on the Biden administration's decision to repeal former Secretary of State Mike Pompeo's ban on flying Pride flags at U.S. embassies and consulates in a Fox News interview on Saturday.
"Every idiotic thing that the Biden administration has done in the first 100 days, you begin to realize—whether it's threatening everybody who believes in the Second Amendment or it's attacking everybody who believes in right to life or it is attacking people of traditional values who are appalled that this administration would fly the gay flag at American embassies all over the world—I mean, you just go down item by item and it's almost like they have a checklist of 'What can we do that will really, truly, infuriate traditional Americans?'" Gingrich said. "And I've never seen anything like it. Somebody asked me the afternoon, I told them, 'I couldn't imagine any administration which had been this deliberately anti-American and this deliberately committed to infuriating the majority of the American people.'" And by “majority of the American people” he apparently means majority of the GOP because a Washington Post/ABC News poll released on Sunday found that 52% of Americans at a minimum somewhat approve of Biden's presidency so far. That's higher than former President Donald Trump's approval rating of 42% just before his 100-day marker.
Biden’s decisions have led to an increase of more than one million people vaccinated for COVID-19, with the vaccination count up to 2.67 million from the about 1.5 million people who were vaccinated at the time of Biden's inauguration, according to The Washington Post. A snapshot of COVID-19-related deaths showed 4,380 people died of the virus on inauguration day Jan. 20 compared to a daily average of 677 for the most recent seven-day period the Post tracked.
The newspaper also reported 1.38 million jobs added during the Biden presidency through March, 161 million direct checks sent to people as part of Biden’s $1.9 trillion coronavirus relief package, and an estimated 38% drop in Black poverty resulting from the relief.
“I did not expect him to be as big and as bold as he’s been,” Democratic Rep. Jim Clyburn told Bloomberg. “He’s got to continue to go big.” Activist Amy Siskind tweeted on Saturday: "Biden's first 100 days are coming, and the media will feel compelled to write their both sides narratives, but there is only one: he has been an overwhelming success beyond expectations: 200 million vaccines, world leadership/alliances, healing, social justice and so much more.”
House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy obviously doesn’t interpret Biden’s time in office like Democrats. He called Biden's first 100 days a "bait and switch" in an interview with Chris Wallace on "Fox News Sunday." "I have not met with the president one time, nor had one conversation," McCarthy said. While jumping at the opportunity to criticize a Democratic president, the Republican was decidedly more reticent to discuss a phone call in which Trump allegedly failed to call off his supporters while the insurrectionist riot at the Capitol was unfolding. McCarthy bragged that he was the first person to reach out to Trump about the riot and ended the call saying “he’ll put something out to make sure to stop this.” “And that’s what he did. He put a video out later,” McCarthy said, defending Trump.
“Quite a lot later,” Wallace responded, “and it was a pretty weak video.”
The thing about defending a president who incited an attempted coup because he lost an election is it kind of sucks the credibility from every statement you make following that defense. That isn’t stopping the GOP though.
Read more reputable analysis of Biden’s time in office below as well as a tweet from the president himself:
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"Every idiotic thing that the Biden administration has done in the first 100 days, you begin to realize—whether it's threatening everybody who believes in the Second Amendment or it's attacking everybody who believes in right to life or it is attacking people of traditional values who are appalled that this administration would fly the gay flag at American embassies all over the world—I mean, you just go down item by item and it's almost like they have a checklist of 'What can we do that will really, truly, infuriate traditional Americans?'" Gingrich said. "And I've never seen anything like it. Somebody asked me the afternoon, I told them, 'I couldn't imagine any administration which had been this deliberately anti-American and this deliberately committed to infuriating the majority of the American people.'" And by “majority of the American people” he apparently means majority of the GOP because a Washington Post/ABC News poll released on Sunday found that 52% of Americans at a minimum somewhat approve of Biden's presidency so far. That's higher than former President Donald Trump's approval rating of 42% just before his 100-day marker.
Biden’s decisions have led to an increase of more than one million people vaccinated for COVID-19, with the vaccination count up to 2.67 million from the about 1.5 million people who were vaccinated at the time of Biden's inauguration, according to The Washington Post. A snapshot of COVID-19-related deaths showed 4,380 people died of the virus on inauguration day Jan. 20 compared to a daily average of 677 for the most recent seven-day period the Post tracked.
The newspaper also reported 1.38 million jobs added during the Biden presidency through March, 161 million direct checks sent to people as part of Biden’s $1.9 trillion coronavirus relief package, and an estimated 38% drop in Black poverty resulting from the relief.
“I did not expect him to be as big and as bold as he’s been,” Democratic Rep. Jim Clyburn told Bloomberg. “He’s got to continue to go big.” Activist Amy Siskind tweeted on Saturday: "Biden's first 100 days are coming, and the media will feel compelled to write their both sides narratives, but there is only one: he has been an overwhelming success beyond expectations: 200 million vaccines, world leadership/alliances, healing, social justice and so much more.”
House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy obviously doesn’t interpret Biden’s time in office like Democrats. He called Biden's first 100 days a "bait and switch" in an interview with Chris Wallace on "Fox News Sunday." "I have not met with the president one time, nor had one conversation," McCarthy said. While jumping at the opportunity to criticize a Democratic president, the Republican was decidedly more reticent to discuss a phone call in which Trump allegedly failed to call off his supporters while the insurrectionist riot at the Capitol was unfolding. McCarthy bragged that he was the first person to reach out to Trump about the riot and ended the call saying “he’ll put something out to make sure to stop this.” “And that’s what he did. He put a video out later,” McCarthy said, defending Trump.
“Quite a lot later,” Wallace responded, “and it was a pretty weak video.”
The thing about defending a president who incited an attempted coup because he lost an election is it kind of sucks the credibility from every statement you make following that defense. That isn’t stopping the GOP though.
Read more reputable analysis of Biden’s time in office below as well as a tweet from the president himself:
RELATED: Tracking Biden's promises to Black America: What's in the president's jobs plan for Black people
RELATED: Tracking Biden's promises to Black America: His COVID-19 relief plan does not disappoint
RELATED: As Biden nears 100-day mark, latest polling on his presidency is a thing of beauty