Her appearance is seen both internally and externally as an audition for the press secretary job, which Jen Psaki has said she will leave after a year.
The White House
12:48 P.M. EDT
MS. PSAKI: Hi, everyone. Happy Tuesday. So, I know the COVID briefing is at 1:30, so I’m going to try to get through as many people as possible between now and then. I just have one item at the top.
After an update from our COVID-19 team yesterday you may have seen out there this morning that today the United States will hit 50 percent of adult Americans fully vaccinated. That number was around 1 percent when the President took office, so that’s certainly a significant development.
Alex, that’s all I have for the top.
The White House on Monday lifted the 14-person pandemic limit on the number of reporters allowed in the James S. Brady Press Briefing Room, increasing the number to 24, half its full capacity.
The White House
12:06 P.M. EDT
MS. PSAKI: Hi everyone. Happy Monday. Okay, a couple of things happening around here today. Today is the deadline to file your taxes. That’s not a reminder to all of you, but take it as one if you’d like to. And we encourage everyone to file as soon as possible to make sure they receive the full amount of benefits they are owed.
Filing taxes will ensure people benefit from the three rounds of relief and rescue payments issued since the start of the pandemic, including up to $1,400 per person provided in the President’s American Rescue Plan. Filing also ensures people get all the refundable tax credits they may be eligible for, like the Earned Income Tax Credit, the Child and the Child Tax Credit.
James S. Brady Press Briefing Room
12:58 P.M. EDT
MS. PSAKI: Hi everyone. Happy Friday. All right. So, today, we have another special guest it’s quite a week with special guests; our seventh of the week Chair of the Council of Economic Advisers Cecilia Rouse, a member of the President’s Families Cabinet.
This is not her first time in the briefing room, but, as a quick introduction, she is a renowned labor economist who recently served as Dean of the Princeton School of Public and International Affairs. She previously served as a member of the Council of Economic Advisers in the Obama-Biden Administration, where I had the pleasure of working with her, and on the National Economic Council in the Clinton Administration. She is the first African American and just the fourth woman to lead the CEA in the 74 years of its existence.