The Vatican Abruptly Cancels Live Broadcast of Biden Meeting Pope Francis without Explanation
Credit: Andrew Caballero-Reynolds/AFP via Getty Images.
President Biden had dropped everything, even dealing with many issues at home, to fly to Europe for summits in Rome, Italy, and Glasgow, Scotland, where he would supposedly be more popular than he is now.
However, on Thursday, the Pope abruptly canceled a live broadcast with US President Barack Obama without providing a reason. The Washington Post reported on the odd occurrence:
The Vatican on Thursday abruptly canceled the planned live broadcast of U.S. President Joe Biden meeting Pope Francis, the latest restriction to media coverage of the Holy See.
The Vatican press office provided no explanation for why the live broadcast of Biden’s visit had been trimmed to cover just the arrival of the president’s motorcade in the courtyard of the Apostolic Palace, where a Vatican monsignor will greet him.
Canceled was any live coverage of Biden actually greeting Francis in the Palace Throne Room, as well as the live footage of the two men sitting down to begin their private talks in Francis’ library, at which time the cameras normally would have stopped running.
The Vatican said it would provide edited footage of the encounter after the fact to accredited media.
Is it possible that the Pope took one look at the embattled US president and decided it wasn’t worth the danger of going live? Was there a personal feud going on? There were no explanations provided.
Biden has previously seen Pope Francis three times, but this will be his first as president. Although his progressive views on abortion and gay marriage would lead one to believe otherwise, Biden is the second Catholic President.
President Biden, together with the leaders of Argentina, Australia, Canada, the United Kingdom, France, Germany, India, Indonesia, South Korea, South Africa, Saudi Arabia, Turkey, and the European Union, will attend the G20 summit in South Korea.
However, several G20 leaders, including Russian President Vladimir Putin, Japan’s new Prime Minister Fumio Kishida, and Mexican President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador, will miss the summit to deal with domestic concerns.
They have all stated that they will not be attending in person, though they may participate digitally in sessions. Chinese President Xi Jinping and Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro are among the leaders who are unlikely to attend.
As per Trendingpolitics, the president certainly has his hands full at home with a number of serious issues to manage. It’s safe to assume that things aren’t going well in the Biden White House if he can’t even handle a live broadcast with the Pope.
