White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre dodged questions Wednesday on whether President-elect Donald Trump deserves any credit for the ceasefire deal that is ending the 15-month war between Israel and Hamas.
“Everybody’s going to want some credit,” Ms. Jean-Pierre told reporters at the press briefing. “That’s how this goes when something good happens. Not unusual, it’s not unusual at all.”
“What I can say is the president got it done,” she said.
She argued that it was President Biden’s framework from last May that is the foundation for the deal.
“You see a president that has done everything that he can,” she said. “This is someone who has foreign policy experience — decades of foreign policy experience. He understands what it means to bring people together, he understands what it means to get a deal done.”
When asked how Steve Witkoff, Mr. Trump’s pick for Middle East envoy, got involved in the ceasefire deal, Ms. Jean-Pierre said it “goes back to what the president said right after the election — a peaceful transfer of power.”
“We know that there has to be a continuation of this, we know that the first phase is about to start, there’s going to be a second phase and it’s going to continue. We got to get to a place where this war is done permanently, ends permanently,” she said. “So bringing in the Trump administration, coordinating with them and making sure that they’re having the information that we all have, we are hopeful that this will continue.”
She said National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan characterized his interactions with Mr. Trump’s pick for national security adviser, Rep. Michael Waltz, Florida Republican, as having gone “very well.”
When pushed on giving Mr. Trump some credit for the deal, Ms. Jean-Pierre said they have “talked closely, worked closely, coordinated closely with the incoming administration and that is how we’ve been able to get to this point.”
Mr. Biden himself acknowledged how closely his administration worked with Mr. Trump’s incoming team to get the deal done.
“In these past few days, we’ve been speaking as one team,” Mr. Biden said, adding that he told his team to “coordinate closely’ with incoming Trump officials.
Mr. Biden said it was critical that both administrations were “all speaking with the same voice.”
The president’s remarks came after Mr. Trump had already taken credit for the deal in a Truth Social post before the White House had even made a statement.
“This EPIC ceasefire agreement could have only happened as a result of our Historic Victory in November, as it signaled to the entire World that my Administration would seek Peace and negotiate deals to ensure the safety of all Americans, and our Allies,” Mr. Trump said in the post.
• Mallory Wilson can be reached at mwilson@washingtontimes.com.