Breaking with the prescribed Biden narrative is having dire consequences for some media pundits.
WURD, a Philadelphia-based Black-owned radio station, has reportedly “parted ways” with a host after she said that the White House gave her a list of pre-determined questions before her interview with President Biden last week.
On Saturday, Andrea Lawful-Sanders admitted during a CNN interview that the President's team sent her eight questions to ask ahead of his interview on “The Source” last Wednesday. Lawful-Sanders said she “approved” four of the questions and used them during her sit-down with the president which was Biden's first interview following his unsteady debate performance.
On Sunday, WURD's president and CEO, Sara M. Lomax, announced that Lawful-Sanders and WURD have “mutually agreed to part ways,” emphasizing that “WURD Radio is not a mouthpiece for the Biden or any other admin.”
“On July 3, the first post-debate interview with President Joe Biden was arranged and negotiated independently by WURD Radio host Andrea Lawful-Sanders without knowledge, consultation or collaboration with WURD management,” Lomax said in a statement on Sunday.
“The interview featured pre-determined questions provided by the White House, which violates our practice of remaining an independent media outlet accountable to our listeners. As a result, Ms. Lawful-Sanders and WURD Radio have mutually agreed to part ways, effective immediately,” she added.
Lawful-Sanders' departure comes shortly after a second local radio host came forward to admit that he also received questions beforehand from the Biden White House. In statements given to ABC News, Wisconsin radio station host Earl Ingram confirmed that he was given five questions to ask Biden during their recent chat and wasn't able to get through all of them before the interview ended.
“Yes, I was given some questions for Biden,” Earl Ingram of CivicMedia told ABC News. Ingram, a prominent host of a Wisconsin radio station, interviewed Biden this week in the wake of his debate performance.
Ingram told ABC he didn't see anything necessarily wrong with the practice. “To think that I was gonna get an opportunity to ask any question to the President of the United States, I think, is a bit more than anybody should expect,” he said.
“Certainly the fact that they gave me this opportunity … meant a lot to me,” Ingram said.
Biden's shocking debate performance has triggered an onslaught of negative pushback from his own party.
Last week, multiple U.S. lawmakers publicly called on Biden to be replaced on November's ballot in a shocking rebuke.
Texas Democrat Rep. Lloyd Doggett became the first sitting Member of Congress to publicly encourage Biden to step down last week.
“I represent the heart of a congressional district once represented by Lyndon Johnson. Under very different circumstances, he made the painful decision to withdraw,” he later said. “President Biden should do the same.”
Last week, Kentucky Governor Andy Beshear (D) also seemed to signal support for the idea of Biden stepping away from the race and seemed to promote himself as an alternative candidate.
Despite numerous public pleas, President Joe Biden informed colleagues that he would not bow out of the race according to a letter shared with Congressional Democrats on Monday.
“I want you to know that despite all the speculation in the press and elsewhere, I am firmly committed to staying in this race, to running this race to the end, and to beating Donald Trump,” the president wrote in the letter.
Biden posted the letter himself to his X account.
