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Key takeaways from Biden's first White House news conference
CNN
Convening his first formal news conference Thursday, President Joe Biden stepped into a swirl of issues that have bubbled up at the two-month mark of his presidency, which has been almost exclusively focused until now on confronting the coronavirus pandemic.
He came prepared with a binder of talking points and a goal of staying on message, though at times he meandered and at moments grew defensive. The President broke new ground on his views of the Senate filibuster, said he expected to run again in 2024 and downplayed the prospect of withdrawing US troops from Afghanistan by the looming deadline.
The retired Air Force general announced as the next chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff by President Donald Trump after the abrupt Friday night firing of his predecessor is a respected career F-16 pilot who is described by current and former officials who served with him as a professional with a “strong moral center.”
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Over the past 10 days, Vice President JD Vance put Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky on notice, rattled the confidence of century-old allies in Western Europe during his first foreign trip, decamped to Capitol Hill to help in delicate budget talks and delivered a spirited defense of the Trump administration’s first month to a gathering of conservatives outside the nation’s capital.