Pool Reports of December 11, 2024

In town pool report #1 - gathering for women's health event

Pool is gathering to walk to the East Room where Biden is scheduled to give remarks at the White House Conference on Advancing Women’s Health Research.

Biden's remarks are slated to begin at 11:30 am and will be live streamed here and here.

In town pool report #2 - remarks

President Biden and First Lady Jill Biden walked into the East Room at 11:36 am. There was applause and some cheers which died down quickly as Jill Biden walked to the lectern. President Biden sat in the front row.

Jill Biden started off:

"You're so quiet. It's like a classroom."

After some remarks about the White House decorations, Jill Biden said:

"We all need to feel joy now, during this season, during this time." There was a silence in the room and she paused. "You are all reading into that."

Jill Biden: "My work doesn't stop in January when Joe and I leave this house. I will keep building alliances like the ones that brought us here today." She said she would keep pushing for funding for innovative research on women's health.

Jill Biden mentioned research around extreme morning sickness and then related it to her granddaughter Naomi Biden's pregnancy. "I was particularly interested because my own granddaughter was going through the same thing— because we're going to be great-grandparents." There was applause in the room.

Jill Biden spoke for about 10 minutes and introduced President Biden.

BIden talked about investments in women's health his administration has pushed for.

Biden quotes: "I'm so proud that to date we've secured a billion dollars so far in women's health research."

He said that investing in women's health is important for all Americans. Biden: "We haven't gotten that through to the other team yet."

"Hold on to one more thing we can never lose: hope. Hope hope hope. Because what we need is to raise the expectations of the American people. We have to let them know we haven't forgotten them. Whether it's business, labor, politics, we haven't forgotten them."

"It's not beyond our capacity when we work together."

The event was streamed here

Note on the decorations in the room:

The East Room is decorated for the holiday season. Hundreds of gold and silver pieces of foil hang from strings attached to the ceiling around the room's central crystal chandelier. Two large Christmas trees trimmed with white and silver decorations flank the main entrance to the room.

From the White House:

Today, the President and First Lady are hosting the first-ever White House Conference on Women’s Health Research. The Conference, organized in collaboration with the White House Initiative on Women’s Health Research and the Milken Institute, is bringing together business and philanthropic leaders, academic researchers, women’s health advocates, investors, and federal agency representatives to showcase the President and First Lady’s historic leadership to advance women’s health research and discuss how to continue making progress on improving women’s health.

Full program below:

White House Conference on Women’s Health Research

Opening Remarks

• Jennifer Klein, Assistant to the President and Director of the White House Gender Policy Council
• Dr. Carolyn Mazure, Chair of the White House Initiative on Women’s Health Research
• Maria Shriver, Founder of the Women’s Alzheimer’s Movement

Remarks by Esther Krofah, Executive Vice President of Health, Milken Institute

Presentation: Next Wave of Scientific Innovation in Women’s Health

Research presentations from:

• Dr. Marlena Fejzo, Clinical Assistant Professor of Population and Public Health Sciences, University of Southern California
• Dr. Martha Gulati, Director of Preventative Cardiology, Associate Director of the Barbra Streisand Women’s Heart Center, and Associate Director of the Preventive and Cardiac Rehabilitation Center, Cedars-Sinai Medical Center’s Smidt Heart Institute
• Dr. Lisa Mosconi, Director of the Weill Cornell Women’s Brain Initiative (WBI), Associate Director of the Alzheimer’s Prevention Clinic, Weill Cornell Medicine

Panel: The Business Case for Investing in Women’s Health

Panel discussion moderated by Trish Stroman, Managing Director and Senior Partner at the Boston Consulting Group

• Dr. Jyoti Gupta, President and CEO of Women’s Health & X-Ray, GE Healthcare
• Jess Lee, Partner at Sequoia and Founder of All Raise
• Stephanie Sassman, Portfolio Leader of Women’s Health, Genentech
• Dr. Johanna Grossman, Head of Healthcare and Life Sciences Capital Markets, New York Stock Exchange

Panel: Moving Women’s Health Forward

Panel discussion moderated by Liz Plosser, Editor-in-Chief, Women’s Health Magazine

• Nancy Brown, Chief Executive Officer, American Heart Association
• Robin Arzon, Vice President and Head Instructor at Peloton, and Women’s Health Advocate
• Linda Goler Blount, President and CEO, Black Women’s Health Imperative
• Dr. Elizabeth Comen, Medical Oncologist Specializing in Breast Cancer and Associate Professor of Medicine, NYU Langone
• Joanna Strober, Chief Executive Officer of Midi Health

Closing Remarks

• First Lady Jill Biden
• President Joe Biden

In town pool report #3 - lunch lid until 3 pm

The White House press office announced a lunch lid until 3 pm

In town pool report #4 - lid

The White House press office announced a lid at 4:22 pm.

In town pool report #5 - Biden recorded interviews

From the White House press office:

President Biden recorded interviews on his economic legacy with Nick Hanauer for Pitchfork Economics today and with Faiz Shakir for More Perfect Union yesterday. These interviews will be released next week.