Dec. 2022 White House visitor counts dwarf all other months of the Biden administration
How do visitor counts from the Biden administration compare to the Obama administration?
Visitor logs from Dec. 2022 released last week show unusually high activity at the White House that month compared against all other months of the Biden administration.
White House visitor counts in Dec. 2022 were comparable to visit counts under President Obama in Dec. 2010, but overall visitor counts for Biden’s White House in 2022 were only about a third of the number to the Obama White House in 2010.
First two years of Biden Administration
Visitors in 2021 were suppressed by the government COVID closures. The bump in Dec. 2021 now looks small when 10,000 were allowed to tour the East Wing Christmas decorations during the COVID closure.
The bar plot suggests the White House was not fully “open for business” after COVID until Dec. 2022.
How do these first two years of the Biden Administration compare with the first two years of the Obama Administration? [The Trump Administration never released White House visitor records.]
First two years of Obama Administration
By the numbers
Comparing visit counts in the first year of both administrations is problematic.
President Obama only started releasing visitor records in Sept. 2009 — his first year in office.
COVID closed much of the government including the White Houses in much of the first year of President Biden’s tenure.
Comparisons of the first years of both administration are not meaningful, but the second year comparisons seem appropriate.
Overall, total Biden visit counts were only about 33% of the total Obama visits.
“Tourist” visits were quite low because of COVID with Biden’s 2022 tourist visit counts only about 22% of Obama’s in 2010. [Visitors were categorized as “tourists” when they visited the “visitors office.”]
Visits to named White House “Staff” members under Biden in 2022 were about 53% of the counts seen during Obama in 2010.
POTUS/VPOTUS/FLOTUS visits for the second year under Biden were about 85% of Obama’s second year values.
But, Biden exceeded Obama’s counts in July, September, November and December.
POTUS/VPOTUS/FLOTUS breakdown
Let’s look at the individual components of the POTUS/VPOTUS/FLOTUS numbers.
The “blue” bars in the bar plot above are broken down into separate FLOTUS, VPOTUS and POTUS components below.
Visits to the First Lade were very small except in June and Nov. 2022.
Visit numbers for the Vice-President are quite small, except in June and Dec. 2022.
POTUS numbers were largest in December but fairly high in July and September.
Here’s a breakdown of the Dec. 2022 numbers by day of the month:
FLOTUS. First Lady Jill Biden had only three visitors in two events in December. Two of her visitors were Maria de Lourdes Alcívar Crespo, first lady of Ecuador, and her son Juan E. Lasso Alcívar, an economist and banker. No press reports of this meeting can be found.
VPOTUS. Vice-President Kamala Harris hosted a total of twelve events on Dec. 6, 7, 18, 19, and 21. There were only 3 visitors on Dec 6. and 10 visitors on Dec 7, which are so small they did not appear in the bar plot above.
The number of visitors on Dec. 18, 19, and 21 were much larger: 327, 635 and 179, respectively.
Dec. 18: Two of the 327 visitors were Norman L. Eisen and Debbie Wassermam Schultz, but no press report about the meeting has been found. Harris’ tweet that day may give a clue: “Hanukkah is a special time in our home.”
Dec. 19: Seven events with a total of 635 visitors was held in a tent at the Vice-President’s residence this day. Congresswomen Sharice Davids (KS-03) and Sheila Jackson Lee (TX-18)) attended. PBS’ Amna Nawaz and husband Paul Werdel attended. The purpose of the events is unknown.
Dec. 21: One event with 179 attending. No press report found.
POTUS. President Biden hosted several large events in Dec. 2022.
Dec. 10: 1502 visitors in several dozen events. No press reports found.
Dec. 13: 4299 visitors in several dozen events. Biden signed “Respect for Marriage Act” on White House lawn.
Dec. 16: 1295 visitors [two large events with 665 at 14:30 and 618 at 19:00. Several dozen other events were scheduled minutes apart with only 1 to 3 attending — photo ops?]. No press reports found.
The largest single POTUS event in Biden’s presidency had 4478 visitors on Sept. 13, 2022, when he spoke about the passage of HR 5376, the Inflation Reduction Act of 2022.
New Year’s Eve at White House Bowling Alley
The visitor logs show 17 people met a White House staffer at 9 PM on New Year’s Eve at the Old Executive Office Building Bowling Alley.
The appointment ended 12/31/2022 23:59 according to the records — perhaps the last meeting of the year at the White House.
Related
December 2022 Visitor Log Records Posted, The White House, March 30, 2023.
White House Disclosures Page: Visitor Logs
Son of George Soros scoring easy White House access, records show, New York Post, April 8, 2023.
Biden administration's cozy relationship with Big Tech: White House visitor logs show Silicon Valley executives - including Apple CEO Tim Cook - effectively have a 'staff badge' for the West Wing, critics say, Daily Mail, Feb. 8, 2023.
TikTok lobbyists repeatedly scored visits to Biden White House, records reveal, Washington Examiner, Jan. 9, 2023.
Bankman-Fried Met With White House Aides on Crypto Policy Before FTX Collapse, Bloomberg, Dec. 29, 2022.