What to Expect From Biden's First Presidential Press Conference on Thursday

Joe Biden will host his first formal news conference at the White House on Thursday, a high-stakes test for a president facing questions about two recent mass shootings, a surge in migrant children at the U.S. southern border and the ongoing pandemic.

Biden’s performance will be under close scrutiny after public appearances during his campaign and early presidency were limited by the coronavirus outbreak. While presidents traditionally hold a news conference within their first month in office, Biden has broken with that precedent, prompting critics to accuse his administration of not being transparent.

White House aides have pointed out that the president has repeatedly fielded impromptu questions from the media. He did so on Tuesday during a trip to Ohio, where he spoke about his administration’s response to the mass shootings in Georgia and Colorado as well as Democratic senators’ concerns that his cabinet lacks diversity.

Still, Thursday’s session in the East Room -- which is scheduled to begin at 1:15 p.m. and expected to feature about 40 socially distanced journalists -- will see Biden for the first time field questions on live television on the toughest issues that have dominated the first months of his presidency.

Biden on Tuesday called for lawmakers to adopt “common-sense steps” on gun control after a shooting at a Colorado grocery store this week left 10 people dead. The president said lawmakers should again adopt the assault weapons ban he helped author in the 1990s, and urged the Senate to pass legislation that has already passed the House to toughen background checks.

But new legislation restricting firearms has eluded Democrats for decades. And Senator Joe Manchin -- the West Virginia Democrat who represents a tie-breaking vote in the upper chamber -- has already signaled his opposition to the House bills, which would extend the time a gun sale can be held for a background check and eliminate a loophole that allows private individuals to sell guns without conducting a background check on their customers.

Biden, who made gun control a key issue of his campaign, could signal at Thursday’s event that he’s ready to invest new political capital in trying to craft a bipartisan compromise. Or he could announce that he’s produced a bill repealing liability protections for gun manufacturers -- an unfulfilled “Day One” promise from the campaign trail.

With Congress narrowly divided and leaders there juggling a number of other priorities, attention is likely to shift quickly to what steps Biden can take unilaterally.

Activists have urged the White House to issue new regulations on so-called ghost guns, which are self-assembled and lack serial numbers. And the president may be able to toughen background checks through executive action, or give federal funding to state and local governments to target gun violence.

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