White House vetted questioners for Biden’s Skype chat

Skype publicized Vice President Joe Biden’s recent immigration chat as a chance for regular people to pose questions directly to the Obama Administration. But those who actually got to speak directly with VP Biden were first recruited by Skype and vetted by the White House.

Skype spokesman Chaim Haas said the company reached out last week to people already active in the immigration debate in order to find people to interact with VP Biden and White House domestic policy chief Cecilia Munoz. Skype then submitted a list of would-be questioners to the White House, which eliminated some of them from contention, Haas said. Haas said he could not identify who at the White House was responsible for vetting the questioners and categorized the number of people rejected as “a very small percentage” of those offered. One was removed because the person is a Capitol Hill staffer, but Hass said he did not recall the circumstances around others.