Today’s news conference is a rare event for Biden

When President Biden steps up to a lectern in the East Room of the White House in front of a roomful of reporters Wednesday, he will be playing a presidential game of catch-up that many say he has no desire to win.

A year into his presidency, Biden’s 4 p.m. news conference will be just his second on U.S. soil and his sixth overall, according to historians who track interactions between presidents and the press. When solo, joint and foreign news conferences are factored in, Biden has held fewer than Donald Trump, Barack Obama and George W. Bush during their first 365 days in office.

Such formal events have decreased as the stakes for Biden have increased, dating back to his days on the campaign trail, when meandering, even wonky speeches were snipped into more abbreviated affairs as Biden took the lead in the presidential primaries.

The scarcity of formal news conferences cuts down on the opportunities for a politician with a penchant for gaffes and misstatements to make mistakes — but it also elevates the importance of each one, including Wednesday’s.

This news conference comes on the eve of Biden’s first anniversary in office, and political analysts said that on such occasions keeping a low profile is not a workable strategy.