News Analysis: Biden, who ran on competency and experience, is struggling to manage multiple crises

President Biden campaigned on a pledge to restore competency and stability to government. “You can’t control the hand you’re dealt, and this is one of the worst hands any president has ever been dealt,” said Chris Whipple, the author of a book on White House chiefs of staff and another on the Biden administration to be published later this year. Asked Wednesday about the “eleventh hour” nature of plans for the summit, White House Press Secretary Karine Jean-Pierre laughed off the question, suggesting that last-minute decision-making was standard procedure in the West Wing — even amid a briefing dominated by tough questions about the administration’s response to the infant formula shortage. “I think I was wrong then about the path that inflation would take,” Yellen said when asked about her 2021 comments — reflective of the administration’s overarching view — that inflation posed only a “small risk.” Just hours earlier, Brian Deese, the president’s top economic advisor, refused to make a similar concession. The White House struggles over inflation messaging dates to the second half of last year, a consequential period that reshaped the public mood about the direction of the country and Biden’s performance as president.