7 Other Times President Obama Said He Found Out About World Events By Watching the News

7 Other Times President Obama Said He Found Out About World Events By Watching the News

By Katie LaPotin (30 mins ago) | Headlines, Nation, Politics

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In an interview with CBS News, President Barack Obama claimed not to know that his former Secretary of State, Hillary Rodham Clinton, was using a personal email address to conduct government business while in office.
On Friday, Obama told CBS News’ Bill Plante that he learned about Clinton’s email address:

“…The same time that everybody else learned it, through news reports,” the president told CBS News’ Bill Plante Friday about when he learned about Clinton’s email address.

Obama’s statement seems to contradict White House Press Secretary Josh Earnest’s announcement that the President did, in fact, know about her email address, since he emailed her directly on several occasions.
This isn’t the first time the commander-in-chief has claimed not to know about a controversial issue. In a Facebook post on Monday, congressional candidate Dan Bongino wrote:

Here’s a quick look back at some other times the President has claimed innocence, as pointed out by both Bongino and former CBS reporter Sharyl Attkisson:

1. Fast and Furious: When asked about the gun-running scandal that resulted in the death of border agent Brian Terry in 2010, President Obama told reporters on Oct. 11, 2011, “I heard on the news about this story, that, uh, Fast and Furious.”
2. NSA spying on foreign leaders: President Obama said he didn’t know his administration was spying on foreign leaders like German Chancellor Angela Merkel. He told the press on Oct. 28, 2013 that, “I can assure you that I certainly did not know anything about the IG report before the IG report had been leaked through the press.”
3. The General David Petraeus sex scandal: Petraeus, then the director of the Central Intelligence Agency, was forced to resign in Nov. 2012 after news surfaced that he was having an affair with his biographer. The White House repeatedly refused to answer questions about when the President was finally briefed about Petraeus’ situation.
4. The IRS’s targeting of conservative groups: President Obama told the media in May 2013 that he first learned about the IRS’s improper targeting “from the same news reports that I think most people learned about this. I think it was on Friday.”
5. The Justice Department’s wiretapping of AP and Fox News reporters: When asked about the secret seizure of reporters’ phone records, Obama spokesperson Jay Carney told the media that the president “found out about the news reports, uh, yesterday on the road.”
6. The Department of Veterans’ Affairs healthcare ‘waiting list’ scandal: The White House appeared to be in the dark about the waiting list scandal and cover-up related to medical care for the country’s military vets. Then-Press Secretary Jay Carney told reporters that, “We learned about them through the reports. I will double check if that is not the case. But that is when we learned about them.”
7. The Unauthorized Air Force One photo-op: New York City residents were panicked when, in April 2009, Air Force One — sans President Obama — flew over the Statue of Liberty for a pre-scheduled photo-op. Obama’s response: “It was something that, uh, we found out about, uh, along with all of you.”