Radio host Andrea Lawful-Sanders has resigned from WURD Radio after admitting that her post-debate interview with President Joe Biden included questions pre-selected by Biden’s campaign team, CNN reported Sunday.
“The interview included questions directed by the White House, which violates our practice of remaining an independent media outlet accountable to our listeners,” Sara Lomax, president and CEO of the Philadelphia-based station, said in a statement posted on its website on Sunday. “As such, Ms. Lawful-Sanders and WURD Radio have mutually agreed to part ways, effective immediately.”
WURD is Pennsylvania’s only black-owned talk radio station. Lomax said the station prides itself on being an independent, trusted voice for its core audience, black Philadelphians, and that using questions provided in advance “jeopardizes that trust and is not a practice that WURD Radio employs or supports as a practice or official policy.”
“WURD Radio is not a mouthpiece for Biden or any other administration,” she added.
Lawful-Sanders, the host of “The Source,” spoke with Biden last week and asked him four questions about what’s at stake in this election, his accomplishments, his debate performance and what he would say to hesitant voters. In an interview with CNN’s Victor Blackwell on Saturday, she said those questions were part of eight that Biden’s staff recommended to her before the interview.
“The questions were sent to me for approval. I approved them,” she said.
The move has further fueled the furor over Biden’s repartee that has been brewing since his lackluster performance in the first presidential debate moderated by CNN. Biden’s performance in the debate has left many leading Democrats wringing their hands in frustration and concern amid talk that he should not accept the party’s nomination.
“If the White House is now trying to demonstrate the energy and drive of the president, I don’t know how they do that by sending questions before the interview so the president knows what to expect,” Blackwell said.
Blackwell pointed out that both Lawful-Sanders and Earl Ingram, host of “The Earl Ingram Show” in Milwaukee, who also interviewed the president this week, asked Biden “essentially the same questions.”
A Biden campaign spokesman on Saturday did not deny that the campaign had asked questions, but said, “We do not condition interviews on the acceptance of those questions.”
“It is not uncommon for interviewees to name topics they prefer. These questions were relevant to the news of the day – the president was asked about his performance in the debate and also about his record on behalf of black Americans,” spokeswoman Lauren Hitt said in a statement.
The Biden team announced later Saturday that it would no longer suggest questions to interviewers.
“While interview moderators have always been free to ask any questions they want, we will refrain from suggesting questions in the future,” a source familiar with the booking process for Biden told CNN.
CNN’s Lauren Koenig, Samantha Waldenberg and Betsy Klein contributed to this report.
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