President Joe Biden repeatedly had to ask for stage directions during a press conference with Kenyan President William Ruto Thursday where he appeared stunned by TV reporters who shouted questions to him at the end.
‘Is that it?’ Biden asked at one point during the proceedings, as reporters from U.S. and Kenyan media asked questions to each leader in a pre-cooked format.
‘What was my question?’ Biden asked a U.S. reporter who asked a long inquiry to Biden and Ruto at the same time.
‘Sir, your question was Haiti,’ the reporter told him at the first press conference in a month for the 81-year-old president.
Biden brought down the hammer when the first reporter he called on from a prepared list tried to ask him a pair of questions: one on Haiti, and another an International Criminal Court warrant against Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.
‘One question,’ Biden intoned, although the reporter tried for two anyway.
Biden read conspicuously from printed notes during several of his answers, including while speaking about international lending institutions, injecting a few bromides.
Members of the press, who haven’t had the chance to question the president in a press conference format since April, weren’t satisfied.
A handful of TV correspondents seated up front jumped up from their seats at the end of the 30-minute event to shout at Biden with simultaneous questions about Ukraine, Russia and other matters.
‘Woah!’ Biden said, in apparent shock at the cacophony and burst of questions.
