White House press secretary Jen Psaki was grilled about President Biden joking in response to a question about the crisis in Afghanistan on Wednesday.
Biden was asked by a reporter what he will do if Americans remain in Afghanistan after the Aug. 31 deadline, prompting the president to quip: “You’ll be the first person I call.”
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Fox News’ Peter Doocy pressed Psaki on Biden’s response to the reporter’s question, asking her: “What’s so funny?”
Psaki appeared to be caught off-guard by the question, focusing her answer instead on the administration’s talking points about the ongoing evacuation.
“I think what he conveyed is that he has not — well, what I can convey from here, I should say is that, as he stated yesterday and as the secretary of state just stated, we’re on track to complete our mission by August 31st,” Psaki responded.
“Obviously there are discussions, and the president received a briefing just this morning — as I noted, he asked yesterday for contingency plans and he received a briefing on them this morning, ” Psaki continued. “These are incredibly serious issues and they are discussions that are happening internally.”
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Psaki said that in “addition to the contingency plans” Biden asked for, the pullout plan is “contingent on us achieving our objectives and the continued coordination with the Taliban.”
The president’s spokeswoman also said that Biden has spoken on the issue “multiple times over the last several days” and “also highlighted the fact” that the administration is monitoring “the threats from ISISK.”
Houston Keene is a reporter for Fox News Digital. You can find him on Twitter at @HoustonKeene.
