Biden brings back operative who sexually harassed and threatened to ‘destroy’ female journalist
Tiana Lowe Doescher
It was only a matter of time. Just as the president kicks off his reelection campaign, President Joe Biden has re-hired TJ Ducklo as his senior adviser for communications.
Does that name sound familiar? It should, as the saga of Ducklo’s diatribe marked the most obvious moment that most of us realized Biden’s promise to restore “decency” to the White House was mostly moot.
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For those of you who don’t remember, back at the very start of Biden’s presidency, People magazine published a
press release
fluff piece announcing that Ducklo, then White House deputy press secretary, was dating Alexi McCammond, an Axios political reporter. When Tara Palmeri, then at POLITICO, tried to get the full story directly on Inauguration Day from Ducklo, the Democratic operative told her, “I will destroy you.”
“During the off-the-record call, Ducklo made derogatory and misogynistic comments, accusing Palmeri of only reporting on his relationship — which, due to the ethics questions that factor into the relationship between a journalist and White House official, falls under the purview of her reporting beat — because she was ‘jealous’ that an unidentified man in the past had ‘wanted to f—‘ McCammond ‘and not you,'” Vanity Fair reported at the time.
The report continued, “Ducklo also accused Palmeri of being ‘jealous’ of his relationship with McCammond. (Palmeri had no prior relationship or communication with McCammond before calling her to report on the Playbook item, which was a story that she was assigned and had not independently pursued.)”
At best, this rant constituted sexual harassment. At worst, it was a thinly veiled threat of violence towards a reporter doing her job.
And despite Ducklo essentially conceding guilt — he later apologized for losing his “temper in a way that was unprofessional” — Biden kept Ducklo on for nearly a month after the dust-up went viral, despite the fact that the White House privately learned about it from POLITICO the very next day.
Only after the news went public more than three weeks later did Ducklo’s boss Jen Psaki, then the White House press secretary, give him a slap on the wrist in the form of a one-week unpaid suspension. Ducklo was ultimately allowed to resign in good graces and cash in at a private PR firm in a matter of months.
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“If you ever work with me and I hear you treat another colleague with disrespect … talk down to someone, I promise you I will fire you on the spot,” Biden told his team on his first day in office. “No ifs, ands, or buts.”
Well, Biden belied that boast with his behavior in keeping Ducklo on staff when his team thought the incident would stay private. And now, Biden is shamelessly bringing Ducklo back. In the name of decency, or something.