The Biden administration was heavily criticized Thursday after it made a series of announcements on various hot-button topics ahead of the holiday weekend.
On Thursday afternoon, the White House released a long-awaited after-action report on the botched Afghanistan withdrawal overseen by President Biden in August 2021. Then, hours later, the Department of Education rolled out new Title IX rules expanding the definition of sexual discrimination in an effort to prevent schools from banning transgender athletes.
Also on Thursday, the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) published a 150-page plan on how it would deploy new resources from the Inflation Reduction Act. Buried in the document, which the Treasury Department originally said would come no later than Feb. 17, the IRS acknowledged that it would spend a staggering $45.6 billion on increased enforcement and tax audits.
"I think I speak on behalf of my colleagues in this room when we want the record to reflect that this was sent to us about 10 minutes before the briefing began with little notice, and it’s the very definition of a modern major holiday news dump," CBS News reporter Ed O'Keefe asked White House spokesperson John Kirby on Thursday in a question about the Afghanistan report.
BIDEN ADMIN ROASTED OVER NEW TRANSGENDER TITLE IX REGULATIONS: 'INSANE INJUSTICE'
"You’re releasing this at the beginning of the High Holidays [sic] and after months of requests from Republicans and the broader public," O'Keefe continued.
Kirby responded that the White House believed the report, which is a summary of classified reports assembled by individual defense agencies, was timed in a "responsible" fashion, adding that it was the "culmination of an awful lot of work."
The White House was later criticized for the contents of the report which largely cast the blame of the 2021 withdrawal on the Trump administration. During the operation, 13 American service members were killed in a suicide bombing while manning the perimeter of the airport where evacuations were taking place.
"John Kirby’s comments during today’s White House press briefing were disgraceful and insulting. President Biden made the decision to withdraw and even picked the exact date; he is responsible for the massive failures in planning and execution," House Foreign Affairs Committee Chairman Rep. Michael McCaul, R-Texas, said in a statement.
The administration was also blasted for its subsequent Title IX revisions opening the door to force schools and colleges that receive federal funds to allow transgender students to play on sports teams.
Republican South Dakota Gov. Kristi Noem threatened to sue the administration over the rule, saying "only girls will play girls’ sports."
"What an Easter weekend news dump by the Biden Administration," Noem's spokesperson Ian Fury tweeted. "One wonders why they wanted to hide this? Probably because they know that public sentiment is not on their side."
And the IRS was similarly criticized for announcing its massive $45.6 billion tax and audit enforcement funding. The Inflation Reduction Act bolstered the IRS' budget by $80 billion, allowing the agency to hire tens of thousands of new agents. The House passed legislation in early January to rescind $70 billion of that funding.
"New IRS spending plan allocates $45.6 billion on ramping up audits, more than 14x the spending for improving taxpayer services," tweeted Mike Palicz, the federal affairs manager at Americans for Tax Reform. "Nice Easter news dump."
