Washington: It was a different press conference in the history of White House, when US President Barack Obama took questions only from women reporters and refused to answer those put by male ones.
In the year's last White House press conference that was held on Friday, President Obama made a statement by calling on only women to ask questions. And it was an intentional act.
All eight reporters called on to throw a question at Barack Obama were female and from print media.
Generally, the first rows of Obama's presser are dominated by male TV reporters.
After the press conference, White House Press Secretary Josh Earnest said that they wanted to highlight the fact that how many women reporters day-in and day-out do the hard work of covering the President of the USA.
"The fact is, there are many women from a variety of news organizations who day-in and day-out do the hard work of covering the president of the United States," White House spokesman Josh Earnest said in a statement.
"As the questioner list started to come together, we realized that we had a unique opportunity to highlight that fact," Earnest said.
According to the Washington Post, here is the list of all eight female reporters who got to question Obama at the unique presser that was obviously hailed by the women journalists.
- Carrie Budoff Brown, Politico
- Cheryl Bolen, Bloomberg
- Julie Pace, Associated Press
- Lesley Clark, McClatchy
- Roberta Rampton, Reuters
- Colleen M. Nelson, Wall Street Journal
- Juliet Eilperin, Washington Post
- April Ryan, American Urban Radio
According to the Washington Post, when Obama was leaving the presser, one last question was hurled at him by a male reporter about the President's New Year resolutions.
However, the President who seemed to be in a jovial mood, easily ignored him and instead called on another female reporter, April Ryan from American Urban RadioObama to ask him a question.
Women reporters haile dthe move and Twitter was abuzz with lady journalists' tweets expressing delight at the presser.
"With 8th & last question, it's fact: Obama called only on women at press conf. Women long chafed at dominance of front-row male TV reporters," tweeted Jackie Calmes, ex-WH reporter for NYTimes.
"Covered White House for 10 yrs, never have seen POTUS call on all women reporters #unprecedented!", tweeted CNN National Correspondent Suzanne Malveaux.
