It’s Thursday.
For Thursday, July, 15th, 2021, President Biden has received his daily brief. Shortly before noon, President Biden and Vice President Harris will offer remarks “to mark the day tens of millions of families will get their first monthly Child Tax Credit relief payments.” Later this afternoon President Biden welcomes to the White House the Chancellor of Germany, Angela Merkel for an official visit. After the two leaders meet they will hold a press conference.
According to the Press Call by Senior White House Officials, the schedule for the official working visit begins with a working breakfast at the Vice President residents; Then in the afternoon at the White House, the President and Chancellor Merkel will have a one-on-one meeting, an expanded bilateral meeting, followed by a press conference. And in the evening, President Biden will host Chancellor Merkel for a small dinner with a range of individuals who have long been strong supporters of Germany and the bilateral relationship, which will further demonstrate the close and continuing ties between our countries.
For those interested the reporters on the call seemed to focus their questions on Nord Stream 2.
For example:
Q: First, on Nord Stream: Do you anticipate any breakthroughs with Chancellor Merkel or her team on the Nord Stream issue? And if not, could we anticipate any consequences with regard to the Biden administration’s position on that? Or does the administration sort of bite its tongue, for lack of a better expression, and wait to work with Merkel’s successor and pick up these discussions? So if you could talk about how that will work.
Senior Official says: On the Nord Stream issue, as you know, we’ve been engaging for a while now with the German government at multiple levels on our concerns about Nord Stream 2. This has included engagement by National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan, by the Secretary of State in their conversations with the German government. I do expect that President Biden will raise his longstanding concerns with Chancellor Merkel during their meeting about Russia’s geopolitical project and about the importance of developing concrete mechanisms to ensure that energy is not used as a coercive tool against Ukraine, our Eastern Flank allies, or any other country. We believe that the sanctions waivers that we announced in May have given us diplomatic space to be able to work with Germany, to have these conversations, to try and find ways to address the negative impacts of the pipeline. Our teams have been discussing these concerns. I expect that they will continue discussing these concerns. We are not anticipating any sort of formal announcement or deliverable coming out of the leaders’ meetings tomorrow on Nord Stream. But like I said, the teams have been having very productive conversations on this set of issues and expect that those will continue.
The second question was not related to Nord Stream 2, it was about, sort of, Wall Street and the Official directed the reported to someone else to get the answer.
Well, he’s screwed me over now, and tweeted for the 3rd time, 15 minutes before post time.
I’d have included with the 2 others, but this is directly related to his bilateral meeting with Chancellor Merkel.
When Wednesday’s Open Thread was published President Biden had sent 2 tweets. He added another 2 tweets, giving him a Wednesday Tweeting Total of 4 tweets and 0 retweets.
Tuesday Democratic Senate Leadership announced that the Budget Committee had reached an agreement on a budget resolution.
Majority Leader Senator Chuck Schumer (D-NY) said: The Budget Committee has come to an agreement. The budget resolution with instructions will be $3.5 trillion. If you add that to the $600 billion bipartisan plan, you get to $4.1 [trillion], which is very, very close to what President Biden asked us for. Every major program that President Biden has asked us for is funded in a robust way. And we are making some additions to that. Most important, something that Senator Sanders has led, and convinced America is so important, which is a robust expansion of Medicare, including money for dental, vision and hearing. Joe Biden is coming to our lunch tomorrow to lead us on to getting this wonderful plan that affects American families in a so profound way, more than anything that’s happened to generations. We are very proud of this plan. We know we have a long road to go. We’re going to get this done for the sake of making average Americans’ lives a whole lot better.
C-SPAN tweeted a video of the President’s arrival on Wednesday to the Democratic Caucus Luncheon.
The White House published a readout of his stopping by…
This afternoon the President thanked the Senate Democratic Caucus for the groundbreaking work they had done to reach the budget resolution agreement announced last night, and highlighted that it would grow the middle class, generate strong economic growth, and create millions of jobs.
He also touted the benefits of the historic bipartisan infrastructure framework that forms the other half of his domestic economic agenda, describing how he’s travelling the country and making a case about it and that polling data show the framework resonating strongly with voters in both parties.
The President credited the Senators for their successful work to pass the American Rescue Plan, noting that economic experts have cited it as a leading cause for the record job creation that has taken place since he took office and the doubling of the rate of economic growth in forecasts. And he described the Build Back Better agenda as a follow on to the Rescue Plan, to ensure that we’re rebuilding a stronger, more inclusive and more resilient middle class.
He emphasized that what tied the economic policies they are working on together was that they were built from the bottom up, with a recognition for the role that a good job plays in peoples’ lives, the rising costs families have had to bear from child care, elder care, and tuition, and the fact that when working and middle class families do well, everyone does well.
He also discussed how the means for funding these critical investments is popular with the American people, who know that the wealthiest individuals and corporations often pay a lower tax bill than teachers and firefighters.
The President repeatedly hit on how the effects of climate change are undeniable, and that the public is demanding action that the budget resolution will deliver. And he also spoke to the urgent need to overcome anti-voter laws, especially in a time when autocracies are trying to undermine democracy around the world.
White House.gov. 07/14/2021
Olivia Rodrigo a pop star, apparently, more popular than I mentioned yesterday, also tweeted about her meeting with President Biden.
Her Instagram had more details about the importance of getting vaccinated against the coronavirus, but she did share similar words and the same photo.
Prior to her meeting with President Biden and Dr. Fauci, she attended the White House Press Briefing.
From the White House published transcript:
Psaki: Hi, everyone. All right. So I have a special guest with me today. Joining us in the briefing room is actress and multiplatinum recording singer/songwriter, Olivia Rodrigo, who traversed red lights and stop signs to see us. If you know her music, you’ll get that dad joke there. And we just want to thank you for using your platform and your voice for elevating the important issue of young people getting vaccinated. She’s here today to meet with the President and Dr. Fauci later this afternoon, but she agreed to come say a quick hello to all of you first. With that, I’ll turn it over to you, Olivia.
Rodrigo: Hi. First, I want to say I am beyond honored and humbled to be here today to help spread the message about the importance of youth vaccination. I’m in awe of the work President Biden and Dr. Fauci have done, and was happy to help lend my support to this important initiative. It’s important to have conversations with friends and family members, encouraging all communities to get vaccinated, and actually get to a vaccination site, which you can do more easily than ever before, given how many sites we have and how easy it is to find them at Vaccines.gov. Thank you, Jen, for having me today. And thank you all for helping share this important message. It’s so appreciated it. Thank you.
The White House also published a short 16 second video where Rodrigo says to get vaccinated. She stresses it doesn’t matter if you are young and health, get vaccinated anyway.
The President and Vice President’s remarks are scheduled for 11:45 a.m. D.C., time.
President Biden has tweeted 1 time, so far, I’m including it here as it’s directly related to the remarks he’ll offer this morning.
He has tweeted a second time, not actually related to the below press statement, but it might, be mentioned.
The White House Press Briefing is scheduled for 12:30 p.m. D.C., time. Today’s special guest is the U.S. Surgeon General Dr. Vivek Murthy.
The joint presser between President Biden and Chancellor Merkel is scheduled to start around 4:15 p.m. D.C., time.
This is an Open Thread.
