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President Joe Biden heads to Baltimore on Thursday evening for his third CNN town hall, plumping once again for his favorite TV forum while continuing to avoid one-on-one interviews.
He has given just 10 interviews in his first nine months in office, falling well short of his two immediate predecessors Donald Trump and Barack Obama who had done 57 and 131, according to Mark Knoller, a former CBS News White House correspondent who maintains a tally.
And the pace of those interviews has slowed - five came in Biden's first two months in office.
Critics within his own party see a siege mentality in a president even as he reaches a crucial moment in steering his massive spending plans through Congress.
'The guy has always been a gaffe machine. He loves talking but the people around him want to keep him under wraps,' said a Democratic strategist who asked speak on background in order to freely discuss White House strategy.
'This is one way to do it but you lose a bit of what makes Joe tick.'
President Biden heads to Baltimore on Thursday for a CNN town hall. It is his third appearance at such an event since taking office but he trails his predecessors for number of interviews
By this time in their first term, President Trump had conducted 57 interviews and
