US President Joe Biden took aim at news outlets that use “lies told for profit and power” to stir up hatred in a possible preview of his 2024 presidential campaign theme. Biden, speaking at the annual White House Correspondents’ Association dinner, referred to “truth buried by lies” in an apparent reference to false conspiracy theories that his 2020 election win was the result of voter fraud. “Lies told for profit and power Lies of conspiracy and malice repeated over and over again are designed to generate a cycle of anger, hate, and even violence,” Biden said.
The president also criticized what he called an “extreme press” while joking that if he called Fox News “honest, fair, and truthful,” then he could be sued for defamation. Earlier this month, Fox Corp. settled a defamation lawsuit by Dominion Voting Systems for $787.5 million in a case that centered around Fox’s false claims that the 2020 presidential election had been manipulated in favor of Biden.
Biden’s remarks also criticized the emboldening of local jurisdictions to ban books and the stripping away of “the rule of law and our rights and freedoms.” He also made light-hearted jokes, quipping that comedian Roy Wood Jr. had offered him $10 to keep his speech short, adding, “That’s a switch—a president being offered hush money.”
Before the dinner, Biden held a private meeting with the family of Evan Gershkovich, the Wall Street Journal reporter who was arrested on March 30 in Russia and subsequently charged with espionage. Biden said that “journalism is not a crime” as he spoke of efforts underway to free reporters all over the world who are being held in detention.
Presidents usually attend the dinner and use their speeches as nods to the First Amendment, which guarantees freedom of speech and the press. However, the deep partisanship that has washed across American politics in recent years has turned the light-hearted dinner into a tense affair. In 2011, then-President Barack Obama used part of his speech to skewer Donald Trump, who was sitting in the audience. At the time, Trump had been spreading the falsehood that Obama was not born in the United States.