CNN
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Joe Biden’s team gave a list of questions to a radio host who interviewed the president this week in the debate’s aftermath, the host told CNN.
“The question was sent to me for approval, and I approved it,” Andrea Lawfull Sanders, host of Philadelphia’s “The Source,” said in an interview with CNN’s Victor Blackwell on Saturday’s “First of All.”
When Blackwell asked Lawful Sanders if the White House had sent him any questions for approval, he replied, “Yes.” “I received some questions. Eight of them. The four that were selected were the ones I approved,” he added.
CNN later revealed that the interview was conducted by a Biden campaign official.
Blackwell noted that both Lawful Sanders and Earl Ingram, host of Milwaukee’s “Earl Ingram Show,” who interviewed the president this week, asked Biden “essentially the same question.”
A Biden campaign spokesman on Saturday did not deny that the campaign had provided the questions but said, “We have not made accepting these questions a condition of the interview.”
“It is not unusual for interviewees to share their favorite topics. These questions were related to the news of the day and the President was asked not only about his performance in this debate but also about what he has accomplished for Black Americans,” spokeswoman Lauren Hitt said in a statement.
The Biden campaign announced late Saturday that it would no longer suggest questions to interviewers.
“While interview hosts have previously been free to ask any question, they will now refrain from suggesting questions,” a source familiar with Biden’s booking practices told CNN.
The radio interview comes at a critical time for Biden’s political future, as elected officials, Democratic donors and supporters increasingly express deep concerns about Biden’s age and his ability to serve a second term as president.
Biden also took questions from reporters on Friday, speaking exclusively to ABC News’ George Stephanopoulos in a 22-minute interview about his age and eligibility to serve as president. He is due to take questions from reporters again next week at the NATO summit in Washington.
Biden, who has faced intense scrutiny this week, stumbled over some things during his conversation with Lawful Sanders.
“As I said, I’m proud to be the first vice president, the first Black woman to work with a Black president, and to be associated with the first Black woman on the Supreme Court,” she said in the interview, recorded Wednesday and aired Thursday.
Reached for comment Thursday night, a Biden campaign spokesman blasted the president’s criticism of mismanagement as “absurd.” “President Biden’s intent was clear when he spoke about his historic record, including a record number of appointments to federal judges,” spokesman Amar Moosa said.
Lawful Sanders’ comments came after the Biden campaign’s social media accounts shared a video on Monday of a local Virginia news anchor saying she declined an interview after Donald Trump’s campaign solicited questions in advance. The interview was scheduled to take place the day after the debate, in conjunction with the former president’s rally in Chesapeake, Virginia.
“We wanted to hear more from Mr. Trump tonight. Our own Mike Gooding was scheduled to interview the former president after the rally,” WVEC anchor Dan Kennedy said. “But just about 15 minutes ago, the Trump team canceled Mike Gooding’s interview after asking us what questions we wanted to ask the former president, telling Mike that they were running out of time and that the former president only wanted to talk about last night’s debate.”
In a video posted to social media, the Biden campaign condemned Trump for canceling the interview, writing, “A paranoid and overwhelmed Trump canceled a television interview after asking a reporter what questions he had planned to ask.”
When asked by CNN on Saturday whether Trump had declined the interview, the former president’s campaign ignored it, instead accusing Biden of providing questions to interviewers in advance.
“President Trump held a rally in Virginia and then gave local interviews afterward that covered a variety of topics not just related to the debate,” campaign spokesman Steven Chang said. “Meanwhile, Joe Biden and his campaign are trying to intimidate the media into asking pre-screened and approved questions and make it look like this is normal behavior, which is not the case.”
This story has been updated with additional information.
CNN’s Aaron Perish and Kate Sullivan contributed to this report.
