Who Thought Inviting Mark Hamill to the White House Press Briefing Was a Good Idea?

Actor Mark Hamill made an unexpected appearance at the White House on Friday. I know what you’re thinking: “Mark Hamill?” I’m sure they could have found someone else with significantly more star power than Hamill, whose claim to fame is portraying one character in a movie franchise that first started nearly fifty years ago.

While his invite to the White House was bizarre on its face, someone decided to roll him out during the daily press briefing. He looked and sounded like a homeless man who was put in a suit and was offered a free lunch in exchange for tooting Biden’s horn at the podium.

And frankly, that’s all he did.

"I have a special guest, as you can see,” White House Press Secretary Karine Jean-Pierre began. "Mark Hamill has decided to join us on this wonderful Friday, and I am really excited to turn it over to Mr. Hamill. Here you go,”

She then gave Hamill the podium.

"Just for — okay,” Hamill began, clearly a bit flustered. "How many of you had 'Mark Hamill will lead the press briefing' on your bingo card? Hands? Yeah, me either."

Trust me, nobody does.

Hamill then continued with some of the most cringeworthy fanboying I’ve ever seen.

"And look, I just got to meet the President,” he said. "He gave me these aviator glasses to me. I love the merch. Love it all."

Hamill continued with a rather shameless effort to memorize talking points.

But listen, I just wanted to say I was honored to be asked to come to the White House to meet the President — the most legislatively successful president in my lifetime. And, you know, I don’t have to go through the list — the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law, the PACT Act, the CHIPS Act, all of that — Inflation. Fifteen million jobs. Look, it’s all good.
I mean, I was really thrilled to meet the entire staff because you know it’s not just one person. It’s like a composite endeavor. And all these people — my goodness. You know, I mean, I have no idea — I had no idea just what went into what is on his plate on a daily basis. So, that’s pretty much it. I’m open to questions, although no “Star Wars” questions, please.
But I want to say once again how grateful I am. And it just shows you that one person can be so influential and so positive in our lives. And again, thank you so much.

The only thing missing from this event was Rob Reiner. I’m sure they would have loved to tag team this ridiculous Biden love fest.

He went on to express gratitude for the opportunity to meet with Biden and recall his previous visits to the Carter and Obama White Houses but noted that this visit was particularly special because he got to go into the Oval Office. He then told how, during his interaction with President Biden, he jokingly asked Biden if he could refer to him as "Joe-bi-Wan Kenobi." Hamill then quickly relinquished the podium to Jean-Pierre.

And that was it. He didn’t promote any cause or use the opportunity to call attention to an issue near and dear to his heart. It was just a shameless love fest that took Hamill’s gushing over Biden off X/Twitter briefly and into the briefing room.

Even the media seemed perplexed by the visit.