- Xbox Cloud Gaming frustrations mount amid long wait times and game sessions failing to start OnMSFT.com
- Here’s Why Most Gamers Would Prefer Buying Starfield from Steam Rather Than Xbox/PC Game Pass FandomWire
- ‘Starfield’ Gets Its Harshest Review Yet: Bethesda’s Game Is ‘Small’ A ‘Shallow Ocean’ Forbes
- Starfield Just Destroyed One of Skyrim’s Records ComicBook.com
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Tag Archives: Frustrations
‘Stop aiming at my face when I’m mad’: Jon Rahm takes out frustrations on camera and microphone as PGA Championship struggles continue – CNN
- ‘Stop aiming at my face when I’m mad’: Jon Rahm takes out frustrations on camera and microphone as PGA Championship struggles continue CNN
- PGA Championship: Jon Rahm rallies to make the cut at Oak Hill, but it may be too late for a real run Yahoo Sports
- Jon Rahm hits on-course mics, tells camera operator ‘Stop aiming at my face when I’m mad.’ Awful Announcing
- Jon Rahm among big names who rallied to make cut at Oak Hill – PGA TOUR PGA TOUR
- Showers produce major drenching at rain-soaked PGA Yahoo Sports
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‘They are fighting’: South Florida drivers’ frustrations mount amid fuel distribution issues – WPLG Local 10
- ‘They are fighting’: South Florida drivers’ frustrations mount amid fuel distribution issues WPLG Local 10
- Weather alert: Fort Lauderdale airport resumes flights as flood recovery begins Miami Herald
- Fuel trucks now ‘catching up’ after flooding issues subside at Port Everglades WPLG Local 10
- Fear of flooding in Fort Lauderdale: ‘Think I’ll sell it and walk away. I’m too old for this.’ South Florida Sun Sentinel
- Fort Lauderdale airport ground stop lifted as storms move offshore from hard-hit South Florida South Florida Sun Sentinel
- View Full Coverage on Google News
Jill Biden talks frustrations at DNC fundraiser: ‘I had to be the first lady of the moment’
First lady Jill Biden spoke at a private Democratic National Committee (DNC) fundraiser on Saturday, discussing some of the challenges and frustrations she and husband, President Joe Biden, have faced as the administration has sought to address a range of issues.
She said the president had to grapple with a range of issues as president, hindering his ability to focus on other plans and goals, according to CNN.
“He’s just had so many things thrown his way,” Jill Biden said while in Nantucket, Mass., the network reported. “Who would have ever thought about what happened [with the Supreme Court overturning] Roe v Wade? Well, maybe we saw it coming, but still we didn’t believe it. The gun violence in this country is absolutely appalling. We didn’t see the war in Ukraine coming.”
“[The President] had so many hopes and plans for things he wanted to do, but every time you turned around, he had to address the problems of the moment,” CNN reported.
President Biden has suffered decreasing approval ratings and has been caught up in an abundance of domestic and international issues since he took office. These include backlash against the military evacuation from Afghanistan, persistently high inflation and the Russian invasion in Ukraine. He’s also faced infighting among his party that has, at times, hindered the ability to pass legislation on topics that are a priority for him.
Recent polling has also revealed that voters, including Democrats, are not very enthusiastic about a 2024 Biden presidential bid, even though the White House has maintained that he will be running in the next election cycle.
That polling has complicated an already challenging midterm environment for Democrats who are bracing for losses in November. But Jill Biden sounded undeterred while speaking at the DNC fundraiser about a pessimistic outcome in the midterms.
“I know there are so many nay-sayers who say we’ll get slammed in the midterms. Okay. The Republicans are working hard, they stick together, for good or evil. So, we just have to work harder,” she said, according to CNN.
Still, Jill Biden revealed that she, too, had experienced her own challenges as first lady.
“I was saying to myself, ‘Okay, I was second lady. I worked on community colleges. I worked on military families. I’ve worked on cancer.’ They were supposed to be my areas of focus. But then when we got [in the White House,] I had to be, with all that was happening, the first lady of the moment,” Jill Biden said, CNN reported.
Sonic Origins Contributor Shares Frustrations Over The State Of The Game
Sonic Origins’ launch yesterday saw the return of the blue blurs classic Mega Drive/Genesis games, all bundled together on modern consoles. The most noteworthy part of the bundle is Sonic 3 & Knuckles, which sees Sonic 3 ported to consoles with new, HD upgrades for the first time.
To help make this version possible, Headcannon — one of the developers behind the wonderful Sonic Mania — worked together with Sega to recreate the classic interlocking duo in the Retro Engine. Now that the collection is out, Stealth — the alias of Headcannon’s Simon Thomley — has acknowledged some of the problems with the final release and shared some of the complications behind them on Twitter.
The full thread (which is quite long and well worth reading in its entirety) details how Stealth and the team submitted a build that they acknowledge needed some fixes, but Stealth also noted bugs in the final build that were not present in Headcannon’s build — the result of Sega’s integration of the team’s work into the overall Origins game.
Stealth also states that the team wants “these problems to be addressed” and asked to do major fixes before Origins shipped, and enquired about possibly delaying the game, and was told this wasn’t possible — which, with the game locked for launch on Sonic’s birthday, is certainly understandable from a marketing perspective. Headcannon is currently waiting to hear back from Sega on whether it can implement some post-release patches.
It should be noted that Stealth is careful to clarify that the issue is complicated, and he and other members who worked on this version of Sonic 3 are also highly complimentary of Sega employees who are called out by name, including the head of Sonic Team, Takashi Iizuka:
Sega has yet to respond or announce if patches will be issued. While the issues cited above might go unnoticed by new players of the games, Sonic fans who started with the series in the ’90s have been noting various differences. However, the largest changes — those affecting audio tracks credited to Michael Jackson and/or his team — have been attracting the more widespread attention, most notably from Yuji Naka himself.
If there are any updates to the game, we’ll be sure to let you know.
Hudson, Arenado end frustrations in 5-2 Cardinals win over San Diego | St. Louis Cardinals
Dakota Hudson had been waiting for the day he would still be pitching in the seventh inning for the Cardinals. He hadn’t made it past the fifth in his previous four starts.
Nolan Arenado was waiting for the day he would hit something besides the occasional single. In five recent games, he hadn’t even had that, going nothing for 17.
But Hudson, bailed out in the first inning by center fielder Harrison Bader’s diving catch that saved two runs, retired 18 men in a row before the San Diego Padres had two singles in the seventh inning. Hudson finished that seventh inning, allowing just four hits for the game and, more importantly walking only one.
And he finished the seventh ahead because Arenado, the National League Player of the Month for April but certainly not for May, smacked his first homer in two weeks. Arenado’s two-run liner to left in the sixth following a single by Paul Goldschmidt, who almost certainly will be Player of the Month for May, and Arenado’s RBI single in a two-run eighth provided the difference in a 5-2 Cardinals victory Wednesday at Busch Stadium.
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“The first inning looked a little scary,” said Arenado. “But, almost in the blink of an eye, (Hudson) was going seven innings.”
The Cardinals scored their first series sweep at home and wrapped up a nine-game home stand against contenders Toronto, Milwaukee and San Diego with a 6-3 record and they reached the 50-game mark at 29-21, their best mark of the season. “That shows who we are,” said Arenado. “We feel like we’re playing good baseball. But we feel like we can play better.”
The Cardinals have won 59% of their games with the Padres in their histories.
After an eventful, 28-pitch first, Hudson righted himself, setting everybody down before Jake Cronenworth singled to right with one out in the seventh. Austin Nolan looped a single to right with two outs, bringing pitching coach Mike Maddux to the mound.
Trent Grisham was to be Hudson’s final hitter. After Grisham drilled a long foul to right, he took strike three as Hudson notched all three of his strikeouts in the seventh inning.
“He stepped it up and gave us exactly what we needed today,” manager Oliver Marmol said.
Hudson (4-2) said, “Harry (Bader) makes a great play. I go back out there and make some adjustments. I think less is more.”
The 27-year-old right-hander said he had a talk with himself after the first inning. “I said sitting there thinking to myself, ‘I can continue to throw the way I was throwing this past inning and I’ll be out after three. Or I can settle down (and) force some contact. It may not look pretty but I’m going to make it happen,’’’ he said.
When he came off the field after five — and still was in the game, he said, “Wow! It’s been a while.”
Catcher Andrew Knizner, who took foul tips to the left side of his chin — under his mask — and to his forehead, was coherent enough to dissect the Padres’ offensive strategy, which played into Hudson’s hands. “It really engages me when I get hit in the face,” said Knizner. “I’m like Rocky Balboa.”
Of the Padres’ approach, he said, “We played to our strengths — which happens to be somewhat of that team’s weakness. Their whole lineup is first-pitch swingers. (Hudson) executed pitches early. And quick outs. It’s a matter of trusting his own pitches. ‘This is nasty. This is nasty. I can throw that for strikes. Hit it. Put it in play. I dare you.’”
Hudson said, “I felt I was in the zone with everything.” He is 15-3 in his career at Busch Stadium.
Goldschmidt, who already had shoved his on-base streak to 37 games with a walk in the first, drew his second one in the fourth. Again displaying how good a base runner he is, he went from first to third on Arenado’s first of three hits, a single to left. This play set up a sacrifice fly by Juan Yepez, who had two runs batted in.
“It’s not a little play,” said Marmol. “(Goldschmidt) does it often. You watch how he does it — hitting the bag with his right foot, staying in the baseline, not a wide turn, sticks the slide at third.”
Goldschmidt credited Arizona coach Dave McKay, a longtime first-base coach for the Cardinals, Arizona coach Eric Young Sr., and Diamondbacks coordinator minor league coordinator Joel Youngblood.
“Base running was a priority,” said Goldschmidt. “You couldn’t just hit or play defense. If you couldn’t run the bases, they were on you and made sure you did it the right way.”
Yu Darvish nearly was matching Hudson but he couldn’t get Goldschmidt out when he needed to. The Cardinals’ designated hitter reached base for the third consecutive time in the sixth when he singled to left center with one out. That pushed his hitting streak to 23 games.
Arenado then broke the tie with his 11th homer to left off a 94 mph fastball. Arenado, who has 30 homers against San Diego in his career — most among active players — hadn’t homered since May 18 in New York. He hit .196 in May after batting .375 in April.
“It’s June. It’s a new month for him,” Marmol said.
May ended all right for him on Tuesday, with Arenado blooping a hit to end the nothing-for-17. “I said, ‘Oh, man, that was not a good swing,” related Arenado. “But I got a little lucky.”
The carryover, however, was a solid single later in the game and three more hits on Wednesday.
Marmol — and nearly everyone else — awaits both Arenado and Goldschmidt prospering together. “It’s a matter of time,” said Marmol.
Arenado said, “I hope it happens. I feel the last two years, it hasn’t. Whenever I’m playing well, I feel he’s not swinging it. When he’s swinging it, I’m not. It was cool to hit back-to-back days. I feel we never do that.”
Goldschmidt also said, “I keep waiting for (it) to happen.”
In the last month, Arenado said, “I had been beating myself up a little bit. Yeah, it was a tough month. But we’ve got a lot of season left.”
Goldschmidt hit .404 for the month with 10 homers. “He’s in a zone,” said Arenado. “I don’t know if I’ve ever been in one like that before.”
For the record, in only three of the eight months the two have played together have they both hit over .267. It happened in May and July of last year and in April of this year, when Goldschmidt batted .282 — but with just one homer.
Miami Heat’s frustrations boil over in Jimmy Butler-Udonis Haslem spat during loss to Warriors
MIAMI — Jimmy Butler and Udonis Haslem were shouting at each other, fingers were pointed in various directions, some Miami players were trying to play peacemaker and Heat coach Erik Spoelstra slammed a clipboard to the floor in frustration.
And that wasn’t the evening’s low point for the Heat.
The Heat fell 118-104 to the short-handed Golden State Warriors, suffering their second straight loss and the fourth in their past seven games — suddenly, Miami’s grip on the top spot in the Eastern Conference is tenuous at best.
Tempers flared on the Miami bench in the second half, when Golden State started the third quarter on a 19-0 run. During a timeout amid that Warriors’ flurry, Butler and Spoelstra had things to say to each other. Then Butler and Haslem exchanged words, both eventually needing to be held back by teammates.
After the game, it took Miami about 35 minutes to emerge from the locker room for postgame interviews, roughly three times as long as usual.
Heat guard Kyle Lowry chalked the incident up to passionate players who are frustrated with losing. Wednesday’s loss cut the Heat’s lead in the Eastern Conference race to 1½ games over Milwaukee and Boston.
“Listen, our guys really want to win basketball games and we have guys that work extremely hard,” Lowry said. “The passion comes out. The fire and the emotions come out sometimes. But like I said, to us it’s nothing. We conversated and had a conversation and we continue to build.”
Spoelstra brushed the sideline confrontations aside, saying he believes they won’t affect the team down the line.
“We have bigger things to accomplish,” Spoelstra said. “But we do want to play better. Everything else across the board. It starts with our leadership, our veteran players have to lead and then we just have to play better. We got to play more consistently, and that’s really all the discussions were. I know how it could look on the outside, but as I mentioned before, that is more our language than playing without passion or without toughness or without multiple efforts.”
Spoelstra added: “You can use moments during the season to catapult you. You can galvanize together over frustration and disappointment. Teams can also go the other way. I don’t see that with our group. I don’t see that with our locker room. But we have needed a kick in the butt.”
The Heat have one day off before returning to action Friday, when they host the New York Knicks.
The Associated Press contributed to this report.
White House frustrations grow over health chief Becerra’s handling of pandemic
As health secretary, Becerra oversees a $1.5 trillion agency charged with responding to myriad national crises, including disease outbreaks, extreme weather events and housing migrant children at the border. He is responsible for coordinating policy rollouts and communications among health agencies such as the Food and Drug Administration, the National Institutes of Health and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, a job made particularly difficult by the pandemic. The nation’s most prominent health officials, including CDC Director Rochelle Walensky, Surgeon General Vivek H. Murthy and Anthony S. Fauci, the director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, all report to Becerra or his deputies.
Biden Concedes Covid-19 Frustrations, Sees Path for Stalled Legislation
WASHINGTON—President Biden said he likely would have to break up his stalled healthcare, education and climate agenda to get his policies through Congress and threatened Russia with severe sanctions should it invade Ukraine during a wide-ranging news conference wrapping up his first year in office.
The president also acknowledged that many people remained frustrated with his administration’s response to Covid-19.
“It’s been a year of challenges, but it’s also been a year of enormous progress,” said Mr. Biden, citing millions of Americans getting vaccinated in 2021 and passage of a nearly $1 trillion infrastructure bill. “Still for all this progress, I know there’s a lot of frustration and fatigue in this country. We know why—Covid-19.”
During his first formal news conference of 2022, Mr. Biden said he probably will have to split up the roughly $2 trillion Build Back Better proposal, which has stalled after Sen.
Joe Manchin
(D., W.Va.) rejected the proposal late last year, but the president maintained he wasn’t relenting on its ambition.
“I think we can break the package up, get as much as we can now and come back and fight for the rest later,” he said, adding that he thinks he can win enough support for the legislation’s provisions on climate, energy and early-childhood education. Mr. Biden acknowledged that proposals to expand the child tax credit and provide tuition assistance for people attending community colleges may not make it into the package, but he said he would continue pushing to pass those measures.
He reiterated his intent to unleash punishing sanctions against Russia should it invade Ukraine. President
Vladimir Putin,
Mr. Biden said, faces a stark choice and will regret choosing conflict. Mr. Biden appeared to initially suggest that he thinks Mr. Putin will invade Ukraine. “My guess is he will move in,” he said. But he later walked back that statement: “I don’t think he’s made up his mind yet.”
Mr. Biden also articulated a possible diplomatic resolution over Ukraine. He offered to negotiate on the positioning of strategic weapons. He also said that Ukraine’s prospective membership in NATO in the near term isn’t likely, though he said the decision ultimately was the alliance’s. Both issues have been among the demands Moscow has issued over Ukraine.
While he touted progress in fighting the pandemic, the president faces ongoing scrutiny of his handling of the virus, including difficulty obtaining Covid-19 tests for many people. “Should we have done more testing earlier? Yes,” he said. The administration this week started a website allowing people to request free tests through the mail.
“Some people may call what’s happening now the new normal. I call it a job not yet finished,” Mr. Biden said of his pandemic response. “We’re not there yet, but we will get there.” He said the U.S. wouldn’t go back to the lockdowns and closed schools that were common in earlier stages of the pandemic.
The administration has sought to convey in appearances by the president and briefings with top officials that many Americans will be infected with Covid-19, but that those who are vaccinated have no reason to panic.
On inflation, Mr. Biden said the “critical job in making sure that the elevated prices don’t become entrenched rests with the Federal Reserve” and indicated he agreed with anticipated interest rate increases.
He also highlighted steps by the administration to ease supply-chain bottlenecks and said he would work to increase competition in certain sectors, such as meat processing. Those steps have had limited impact, however, experts say. The Fed is facing pressure to tame inflation, and Mr. Biden is confronting the prospect of lingering high prices as the midterm elections approach later this year.
Some business groups have called for lifting tariffs on Chinese imports as a way to moderate prices. Mr. Biden said he wasn’t ready to make that call, indicating he wanted to see Beijing make progress on commitments to purchase U.S. goods under the trade deal worked out by former President Donald Trump.
The forum Wednesday opened a year in which Mr. Biden will try to rally a Democratic base that has been frustrated by his record on climate change and voting legislation despite high hopes when he took office
President Biden spoke about Russia-Ukraine relations, Americans’ frustrations over Covid-19 and the economy at the White House news conference.
Photo:
Oliver Contreras/Sipa/Bloomberg News
Democrats had hoped to have already passed the legislative package known as Build Back Better. Last week, Mr. Manchin and
Sen. Kyrsten Sinema
(D., Ariz.) handed the president another setback by reiterating their opposition to changing Senate filibuster rules to allow passage of voting legislation opposed by Senate Republicans.
Mr. Biden said he would continue to push for passage of Democratic-backed elections bills, arguing that a failure to pass the legislation could raise the likelihood that the coming midterms would be illegitimate. Of Republicans who plan to vote against the legislation, Mr. Biden said: “This will stick with you for the rest of your career and long after you’re gone.”
The administration’s challenges have frustrated many Democrats and contributed to Mr. Biden’s low public approval rating, which stood at 42% Tuesday, according to FiveThirtyEight’s aggregation of public polls, down from 53% when he took office.
A Wall Street Journal poll released in December found troubling signs for Democrats on the economy and other key issues. Voters said they believe Republicans have the better economic policy, 43% to 34%, and the GOP is viewed as better able to control inflation, secure the border, fix the immigration system and reduce crime. Some 46% of voters expect the economy to get worse in 2022, compared with 30% who expect it to get better.
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The Senate is now split 50-50 with Vice President
Kamala Harris
providing tiebreaking votes, and Democrats have a small majority in the House. Should the party lose either chamber, Mr. Biden will face even tougher odds enacting his plans.
Foreign-policy challenges also have dogged Mr. Biden’s administration. He launched a chaotic withdrawal from Afghanistan and has sought to maintain a tough stance on China. Now, his most pressing concern is with Russia.
Asked what he would do differently in his second year, Mr. Biden indicated he wasn’t preparing to shake up his team but said he would get out of Washington more to pitch his agenda directly to Americans. He said he would bring in more outside experts, including those from think tanks, and invite constructive criticism.
He indicated he plans to run for re-election and said Ms. Harris would be his running mate.
Write to Alex Leary at alex.leary@wsj.com, Ken Thomas at ken.thomas@wsj.com and Andrew Restuccia at andrew.restuccia@wsj.com
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CDC director turns to media consultant as Covid-19 messaging frustrations mount
For months, Walensky has met privately with prominent Democratic media consultant Mandy Grunwald to improve her communication skills and continues to do so, according to a person familiar with the previously unreported sessions. On Friday, Walensky will hold the CDC’s first independent media briefing since the summer after deciding abruptly this week that she wanted to take questions “head on,” according to a person familiar with her decision to hold the briefing.
“We’re in an unprecedented time with the speed of Omicron cases rising, and we are working really hard to get information to the American public, and balancing that with the reality that we’re all living with,” Walenksy said.
“This is hard, and I am committed to continue to improve as we learn more about the science and to communicate that with all of you.”
Since assuming her role, Walensky has worked to improve her internal communications and sought to cultivate a better messaging approach, according to officials. Yet there remains dissatisfaction among both administration aides and outside public health experts in some of the ways the CDC has communicated its decisions as the pandemic enters what officials view as a new phase.
At the same time, between Walensky circumventing some of the CDC’s rigorous vetting processes for new guidelines and the public criticism, morale at the public health agency is sinking.
When asked if there is a credibility problem at the CDC Friday on NBC’s “Today,” Walensky said the agency moves with the science.
“We at the CDC are 12,000 people working 24/7 following the science, with ever-evolving nature, in the midst of a really fast-moving pandemic,” she said during one of a number of interviews ahead of the briefing. “And we are doing so, putting our head down, to keep America safe. We will continue to update. We will continue to improve how we communicate to the American public. This is fast-moving science.”
CNN has reached out to the CDC for comment. The White House declined to comment, pointing toward a statement on Wednesday from White House press secretary Jen Psaki. Asked if Biden has confidence in Walensky, Psaki told reporters, “He has confidence in the scientific expertise, the medical expertise of the team at the CDC. And he believes the American people had a desire, a need for us to address this pandemic, led by data and science. And that’s what he’s going to continue to rely on.”
Frustration over changing guidance
The latest messaging setback happened last month when the CDC cut its recommended isolation period for those with Covid-19 to five days, and recommended people who tested positive should continue to wear a mask in public for five additional days. Confusion ensued, with some outside experts urging the CDC to add a recommendation for a rapid antigen test at the end of the first five days.
Behind the scenes, other federal public health officials also questioned the decision not to include testing. Both Dr. Anthony Fauci, the President’s top medical adviser on Covid-19, and US Surgeon General Dr. Vivek Murthy publicly made clear clarifications were coming.
Amid the public backlash, Walensky sought to reassure fellow senior federal health officials, telling Fauci and Murthy that the lack of a testing requirement in the isolation guidance was not motivated by the nationwide testing shortage, one person familiar with the discussions said.
Instead, she insisted that rapid antigen tests were simply not a sufficiently reliable indicator of contagiousness and noted to her colleagues that the US Food and Drug Administration had not approved the tests for that purpose.
She told CNN, “We actually don’t know how our rapid tests perform and how well they predict whether you’re transmissible during the end of disease.”
The explanation didn’t sit well with FDA officials, who — despite having issued a vague statement at about the same time about sensitivity of rapid antigen tests toward Omicron that lacked specific details — were concerned her comments could sow doubt in the reliability of rapid tests.
“When you are leading an agency like that, the gravity of your words is so much heavier than when you’re just commenting on it,” an administration official later told CNN.
Eschewing traditional CDC processes
After working on the guidance with her circle of advisers, Walensky called an emergency meeting of the officials leading the CDC’s Covid-19 Incident Management System on the eve of the release of the new guidance to inform them of the coming guidance, according to the CDC scientist.
“She’s dispensing with this consultative process that we’ve always had in place that sort of allowed us to make sure that our science was good,” the scientist said.
Officials in the meeting were told not to share the new guidance with state health officials on a weekly call the next day, which took place just hours before the CDC released a statement announcing the changes.
“The lack of engagement and consultation on that (new guidance) obviously contributed to a lot of the outrage,” the scientist said.
After Walenksy spent a week steadfastly defending the agency’s decision not to include a recommendation for a rapid test after five days, the CDC changed course, telling people with access to rapid tests to continue to isolate if they decided to take a test and received a positive result. But the new guidance did not explicitly recommend people should take a test.
“It became very clear that people were interested in using the rapid tests — though not authorized for this purpose — for this purpose after their end of isolation period. And because there was an interest in using them for this reason, we then provided guidance on how they should be used,” Walensky told CNN during a coronavirus briefing on Wednesday.
The latest update also urged people who emerge from the shortened five-day isolation to avoid travel for five more days and not to eat at restaurants.
Those updates only emerged after Walensky and her team tasked CDC experts with turning the press statement announcing the changes into formal public health guidance, a process that would typically happen ahead of a news release.
The CDC’s back and forth on testing after five days of isolation did not go over well in the medical community.
“Nearly two years into this pandemic, with omicron cases surging across the country, the American people should be able to count on the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) for timely, accurate, clear guidance to protect themselves, their loved ones, and their communities. Instead, the new recommendations on quarantine and isolation are not only confusing, but are risking further spread of the virus,” the American Medical Association said in a statement.
‘They’re overthinking their messaging’
In some ways, the disconnect with the CDC is a perpetual one between an inherently political operation and one driven by public health experts.
Current and former senior administration officials said the White House has been frustrated with the CDC over its messaging of public health guidelines, even as they acknowledge the decisions the agency makes have sound backing. Meanwhile, some scientists at the CDC feel like the new guidance Walensky is implementing is being insufficiently guided by the science and is overly taking into account political and economic considerations.
Still, the White House has aimed to stick to its hands-off approach to the CDC, seeking to draw a distinction with the previous administration and avoid any impression they are influencing public health measures driven by government scientists.
“I think they’re being way too careful and they’re overthinking their messaging,” a former senior Biden administration official said of the CDC. “They’re smart people and they’re guilty of just being a little bit in a bubble and overthinking things.”
While the CDC’s latest guidance on isolation amounts to the clearest example of the agency’s public messaging woes, former officials said previous CDC messaging — including on masks — have been a source of friction with and frustration within the White House.
“They make insular decisions with the agency — or even within a small group within the agency — and then wait until the last minute to tell everyone it’s coming, so they rush it out without getting reasonable feedback from people who could help address real issues,” one administration official told CNN, referencing other federal health agencies.
In May, Walensky said fully vaccinated people could stop wearing masks indoors, only to reverse course a few months later when new information showed even those with all the recommended shots could still transmit the virus.
The White House was also forced to explain Walensky’s comments in February that teachers did not need to be fully vaccinated for schools to reopen; a day later, Psaki said Walensky was speaking in her “personal capacity.”
White House officials have been loathe to blame Walensky directly, pointing instead to longstanding institutional issues at the CDC and an overly cautious approach among scientists there, which they believe leads to overly complicated or incomplete public health guidance.
“The White House being frustrated with the CDC is like there being sand on a beach,” this former official said. “It’s an age-old thing.”