Sports

(LAS VEGAS) — The Las Vegas Raiders recently announced Sandra Douglass Morgan as the team’s newest president, making her the first Black female team president in the National Football League’s history.

“It’s really a dream come true,” she told ABC News’ Amy Robach on “GMA3.”

Morgan has previously served as the chairwoman of the Nevada Gaming Control Board, worked as a city attorney and was a member of the city’s COVID-19 task force. She was born and raised in Las Vegas, and completed her undergraduate degree at the University of Nevada, Reno and graduate law degree at the University of Nevada, Las Vegas.

She is the third female president and third Black president of an NFL team.

“I’m just really, really lucky to have this opportunity and hopefully open doors for many other women and women of color in leadership roles in sports,” she told ABC News.

The team has faced some challenging moments over the past few years, with a number of top executives resigning or being fired.

Former Raiders president, businessman Dan Ventrelle, held the office for less than a year and left in May. The Raiders organization did not comment on the reason.

In a statement to the Las Vegas Review-Journal, Ventrelle claimed he was fired in retaliation because he had raised concerns to the NFL about “a hostile work environment” and “other potential misconduct” from the team’s owner Mark Davis.

The NFL announced it would open an investigation into the claims in May 2022, the Washington Post reported.

David said in a July 2022 statement that “we did an investigation into all those things,” the Las Vegas Review-Journal reported. “We listened to the people who work in the organization and I believe we started to make those changes that are necessary to get the culture back to where we feel we can all be positive.”

The New York Times reported that since the Raiders team moved from Oakland, California, to Las Vegas in 2020, “six of the team’s eight top executives quit or were fired with little explanation.”

Former Raiders president Marc Badain resigned in July 2021 after 30 years with the organization.

Davis eventually told reporters that Badain, as well as the organization’s chief financial officer and controller, left because of “accounting irregularities.”

Former Raiders head coach Jon Gruden resigned after reports about inappropriate emails he sent went public, writing on Twitter: ​​“I love the Raiders and do not want to be a distraction,” adding, “I’m sorry, I never meant to hurt anyone.”

“It’s no secret that this organization has faced some recent challenges,” Morgan said in a press conference on Thursday. “I want to be clear, I am not here to sweep anything under the rug or avoid problems or concerns that need to be addressed.”

“I have accepted this role because I believe in the promise of the Raiders, I believe in the future of the Raiders,” she added.

She spoke about the role sports plays in the city’s economy, and her goal of making Las Vegas the “sports capital of the world.” The football team’s home field Allegiant Stadium opened in 2020 and, at a cost of $1.9 billion, it is thought to be the second-most expensive stadium in the world.

During the press conference Thursday Morgan claimed that “the Raiders organization has brought $2.29 billion in economic impact [through] visitors of events in Allegiant Stadium.”

It has already been announced that the 2024 Super Bowl will be held at Allegiant Stadium.

Morgan serves on the board of Allegiant, a low-cost airline headquartered in Las Vegas, as well as Caesar’s Entertainment, the casino and hotel company based in the city.

Both of these organizations are sponsors of the stadium.

“We’ll continue to monitor [those appointments] if there’s an issue,” she said during the press conference, responding to a reporter’s question. “Obviously, those boards know that the Raiders are my first priority.”

“I can’t wait to have this new season and a full stadium at Allegiant Stadium,” Morgan told ABC News. “We’re ready to go and ready to kick it off.”

Copyright © 2022, ABC Audio. All rights reserved.Michela Moscufo, ABC News

(NEW YORK) — The Washington metropolitan region is home to a number of basketball greats, including NBA star Kevin Durant and the late NCAA legend Len Bias.

Among them is Delonte West, a former college basketball third team All-American who was the 24th overall pick by the Boston Celtics in the 2004 NBA draft.

West played eight seasons in the NBA alongside names like Paul Pierce and Dirk Nowitzki with his final stint at the point guard position for the Dallas Mavericks in 2012.

“Basketball you know, for some it is just something to do. For me, it [was] a lifestyle growing up in the DMV (District of Columbia, Maryland, Virginia region),” West told ABC News in April, in a rare interview.

Though West shined on the court, he suffered in silence. Despite clutch jumpshots and game-winning alley-oops, West was struggling mentally under the pressure to succeed, and any game-time highs were paired with personal lows.

Starting in 2013, West was acquired by the Texas Legends, part of the “minor league” NBA D-League (now known as the G League). He played with the team for the better part of the year before signing a 1-year deal with the Fujian Sturgeons in the Chinese Basketball Association. From there, he bounced around the international scene, heading back to the Texas Legends in 2015, before ultimately being waived in April that year.

Despite the constant back and forth, he said the game kept him going.

“Living a life of mental illness, they call it — I like to say mental superpowers — you know, basketball was always my escape.”

West was diagnosed with bipolar disorder in 2008.

Bipolar disorder, according to the National Institute of Mental Health, is a mental disorder that causes “unusual shifts in mood, energy, activity levels, concentration, and the ability to carry out day-to-day tasks.”

An estimated 2.3 million Americans have bipolar disorder, and it affects people of all races. According to 2018 research available on the National Institutes of Health website, “people of African ancestry with bipolar disorder (either type I or II) have higher rates of misdiagnosis in comparison to people of non‐African ancestry with bipolar disorder.”

“It’s definitely been a spiritual journey you know, dealing with being bipolar,” said West. “A missed shot or lost game, it can turn it into a spiraling snowballing depression type of thing where, you know, to where it takes me hours or it took me hours just to leave the gym.”

West sought counseling and began taking medication but said the struggles between maintaining peace, calming his racing mind, and unleashing fury on the court were too tough to manage.

In 2012, the Mavericks suspended West twice, once for a reported locker room “outburst” and again for what the team’s president of operations, Don Nelson, called “conduct detrimental to the team.”

A series of off-court incidents accelerated his eventual exit from the game. A photo of West seen panhandling in Temple Hills, Maryland, went viral in 2016 leaving fans concerned, though West told the site Media TakeOut he had been helping an unhoused man in his neighborhood at the time, and was not homeless as some thought.

In 2020, photos of West reportedly panhandling made their way across social media. Mavericks owner Mark Cuban later picked him up at a Dallas gas station in an attempt to help get West back on his feet, according to ESPN, which confirmed the story with Cuban himself.

“Mr. Cuban, he’s been a guy in my life since I met him,” said West. “… He wanted me to be the best person I can be.”

“He’s been in my corner,” West added.

Cuban eventually helped reunite West with his mother and helped him financially, so West could focus on his family.

West has two children with wife Caressa Madden, whom he married in 2013.

“[Cuban] said, ‘hey, man, listen, I’m giving you a break away from the game,'” West said. “I’m going to handle your finances, you know, give you some time to raise these two babies.”

In 2020, West also entered a drug rehabilitation clinic with Cuban’s help.

“He said, ‘man the most important thing is that we get you feeling OK with yourself and being OK with life outside of basketball,’ because that’s the father my children need,” he said.

West was still hopeful that he might get back into basketball. In April, he was working out daily to prepare for Ice Cube’s Big3, a league made up of 12 teams of retired basketball players and international athletes, who play 3-on-3 games in an eight-week regular season. The league also hosts a playoff series and championship.

West had punched his ticket to the tournament at the D.C. open tryout, and eventually made it to the second round Las Vegas combine.

He went unselected.

“I was excited to have the opportunity,” West told TMZ Sports at the time. “I’ll be there next season. I’ll be there rooting guys on.”

Not every story has a fairytale ending, but West is still determined to make it meaningful.

Earlier this summer, he secured a freelance gig with ArmorGuard Coatings in Fredericksburg, Virginia, recently landing a flooring job at a Subaru dealership in the city.

“I told him that he can work with me full-time if he wanted but he told me he is still trying to do basketball,” ArmorGuard owner David Drake told ABC News.

So Drake offered West a solution that worked for both of them: When a job is available, and West is available, he can work for the company and still have the time to focus on basketball.

“I told him I’m just trying to help him and help myself,” Drake said. “I need a good worker and he’s a good worker.”

There’s a lot in the air for West right now, and he’s hopeful that things will start to fall into place soon.

His manager, Donovan Fordham, hopes so too.

“We’ve always known that Delonte’s journey back to a normal life, a place of inner peace and even a return to a basketball career would be one of constant challenges,” Fordham said in a statement to ABC News.

“But we both believe that, with the support of family, friends, former teammates and fans, he will overcome them and become the father, son, friend and teammate that we know he can be.”

Copyright © 2022, ABC Audio. All rights reserved.

(NEW YORK) — Here are the scores from Wednesday’s sports events:

MAJOR LEAGUE BASEBALL

INTERLEAGUE
Seattle 6, Washington 4
Minnesota 4, Milwaukee 1
Seattle 2, Washington 1
Toronto 8, Philadelphia 2
NY Yankees 7, Cincinnati 6
Baltimore 7, Chi Cubs 1

AMERICAN LEAGUE
Kansas City 5, Detroit 2
Tampa Bay 4, Boston 1
Chi White Sox 2, Cleveland 1
Texas 5, Oakland 2
LA Angels 7, Houston 1

NATIONAL LEAGUE
NY Mets 7, Atlanta 3
San Francisco 4, Arizona 3
Miami 5, Pittsburgh 4
LA Dodgers 7, St. Louis 6
Colorado 10, San Diego 6

WOMEN’S NATIONAL BASKETBALL ASSOCIATION
Connecticut 89 Indiana 81

MAJOR LEAGUE SOCCER
Atlanta 2, Real Salt Lake 1
Chicago 2, Toronto FC 0
Vancouver 2, Cincinnati 2 (Tie)
Columbus 2, D.C. United 2 (Tie)
Philadelphia 2, Miami 1
Sporting Kansas City 1 Minnesota 1 (Tie)
Nashville 1 Seattle 0
Orlando City 1 Colorado 1 (Tie)
New York City FC 1, FC Dallas 0
San Jose 3, LA Galaxy 2

Copyright © 2022, ABC Audio. All rights reserved.

MAJOR LEAGUE BASEBALL

INTERLEAGUE
Toronto 4, Philadelphia 3
Cincinnati 4, NY Yankees 3
Milwaukee 6, Minnesota 3
Baltimore 4, Chi Cubs 2
Seattle at Washington (Postponed)

AMERICAN LEAGUE
Cleveland 4, Chi White Sox 1
Chi White Sox 7, Cleveland 0
Tampa Bay 3, Boston 2
Detroit 7, Kansas City 5
Oakland 14, Texas 7
Houston 6, LA Angels 5

NATIONAL LEAGUE
Pittsburgh 3, Miami 2
Final Atlanta 4, N.Y. Mets 1
St. Louis 7, LA Dodgers 6
Colorado 5, San Diego 3
San Francisco 13, Arizona 0

WOMEN’S NATIONAL BASKETBALL ASSOCIATION
Seattle 83, Dallas 74
Las Vegas 107, New York 101
Chicago 90, Atlanta 75
Minnesota 118, Phoenix 107 (2OT)
Washington 94, Los Angeles 81

MAJOR LEAGUE SOCCER
Austin FC 3, Houston 1

Copyright © 2022, ABC Audio. All rights reserved.

(DALLAS) — Former NFL player Marion Barber III died from a heat stroke in his suburban Dallas apartment amid a record-setting heat wave sweeping across Texas, according to the Collin County medical examiner’s office.

The 38-year-old’s death was ruled an accident, the medical examiner said Monday.

Barber, a former running back for the Dallas Cowboys, was found dead in his Frisco, Texas, apartment on June 1 after police were requested to conduct a welfare check on him, according to the Frisco Police Department.

The former Pro Bowl player’s death came at the start of a heat wave in the Dallas area and across Texas that has seen temperatures soar into triple digits, taxing the state’s electrical grid and prompting the Electric Reliability Council of Texas to issue a statewide appeal on Monday for people to conserve energy.

Records from the National Weather Service show that during the week Barber’s body was discovered, daily high temperatures in Frisco ranged from the high 80s to the low 90s.

A full autopsy report on Barber obtained by the Fort Worth Star-Telegram shows that when police officers arrived at Barber’s rented apartment to check on him, the thermostat was set to 91 degrees with the heat set to “on.”

“Mr. Barber was known to exercise in sauna-like conditions,” the medical examiner wrote in the report, according to the Star-Telegram.

Frisco police said Barber’s family members had not heard from him for six days before the day his body was discovered.

Barber’s father, Marion Barber II, also a former NFL player, told the Star-Telegram his son’s body was badly decomposed when officers found him.

A police incident report, obtained by ABC affiliate station WFAA in Dallas, said police were contacted by an employee at Barber’s apartment complex on June 1, who expressed concern for Barber’s well-being.

The employee told police a neighbor submitted a service request on May 11 due to water leaking into their apartment from Barber’s unit, according to the incident report. The employee said he was unable to contact Barber on either May 12 or 13, and added that numerous phone calls and emails to Barber were not answered for two weeks. Police officers found an unopened letter the employee left on Barber’s door when they arrived at the apartment on June 1, according to the incident report.

Officers found Barber’s body in a bathroom shower with the water not running, according to the incident report.

Heat stroke occurs when the body can no longer control its temperature, causing a person’s body temperature to rise rapidly and its sweating mechanism to fail, making the body unable to cool down, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. During a heat stroke, a person’s body temperature can rise to 106 degrees in 10 to 15 minutes, according to the CDC.

Besides an extremely high body temperature, warning signs of heat stroke include a rapid pulse, throbbing headache, dizziness, nausea, confusion and red, hot and dry skin, according to the CDC.

Barber, a standout three-sport athlete at the University of Minnesota, was picked by the Dallas Cowboys in the fourth round of the 2005 NFL draft and played for the team for six seasons, earning a Pro-Bowl selection in 2007. Barber signed with the Chicago Bears in 2011 and played one season for the team before retiring in 2012.

“We are heartbroken by the tragic death of Marion Barber III. Marion was an old-school, hard-nosed football player who ran with the will to win every down,” the Cowboys said in the statement when Barber’s death was first announced. “He had a passion for the game and love for his coaches and teammates.”

A funeral for Barber was held on June 22 at the Huntington Bank Stadium on the campus of the University of Minnesota.

Copyright © 2022, ABC Audio. All rights reserved.

(NEW YORK) — Serbian tennis player Novak Djokovic won Wimbledon on Sunday, beating Australian player Nick Kyrgios in the final in what will likely be Djokovic’s final Grand Slam appearance this year.

For a second consecutive year, Djokovic won’t be able to play in the U.S. Open in August due to his COVID-19 vaccination status.

“The only good news I can have is them removing the mandated green vaccine card…to enter the United States,” Djokovic said during a press conference on Sunday. “Or exemption.”

Djokovic, 35, is not vaccinated. He told the BBC in February that “based on all the information that I got, I decided not to take the vaccine.” At the post-match press conference on Sunday he reiterated that “I’m not planning to get vaccinated.”

The U.K., where Wimbledon takes place, allows travelers into the country without requiring proof of vaccination. France relaxed its entrance requirements in time to allow Djokovic to play in the French Open in May.

Djokovic was deported from Australia in January after his visa was revoked at the Melbourne airport, restored and then canceled a second time because he is unvaccinated.

His visa was ultimately revoked “on the basis that it was in the public interest to do so,” according to Australian authorities.

Although the U.S. Open and New York City, where the tournament will take place, allow visitors without proof of vaccination, Djokovic will not be able to play because of COVID requirements for international travelers set by the U.S. government. The U.S. does not allow people to visit without proof of COVID-19 vaccination.

American tennis player Tennys Sandgren, despite being unvaccinated, will be able to play in the U.S. Open because of this policy.

“Pretty shameful that the USTA won’t fight for an exemption for Novak,” he wrote in a tweet last month. “I can play but he can’t? Ridiculous.”

During the press interview on Sunday Djokovic stated that an exemption to play in the U.S. Open didn’t seem “realistically possible.”

“Though the U.S. Open does not have a vaccination mandate in place for players, we respect the U.S. government’s position regarding travel into the country for non-U.S. citizens,” a spokesperson for the U.S. Open told ABC News.

Mark Conrad, a professor of law and ethics at Fordham University who specializes in sports law and business, told ABC News he would be “very, very surprised if there were a change in policy, especially with the latest variants.”

“I don’t really think there’ll be a lot of sympathy,” he said. “If there’s an exemption for him, there will be a lot of people saying why should he get that exemption?”

“Does the government really care so much to go and stick his neck out for one tennis player, no matter how good he is?”

Copyright © 2022, ABC Audio. All rights reserved.

(WASHINGTON) — The Justice Department has opened a probe against the PGA Tour to see if the tour violated any antitrust laws in relation to their face-off with LIV Golf — a Saudi-backed golf league — a PGA Tour spokesperson confirmed to ABC News.

The PGA Tour says the probe was not unexpected, and they are confident they’ll be vindicated. They didn’t say what specifically the Justice Department was looking into.

The Wall Street Journal was first to report the probe, and the Justice Department is not commenting on the probe.

Financed by the government of Saudi Arabia’s Public Investment Fund, the LIV Golf league burst onto the scene last year as a potential rival to the PGA Tour, reportedly offering large sums of money to some of the PGA Tour’s top players while promising to shake up the world of golf with a new format and larger prize money for tournament winners.

The commissioner of the LIV Golf league is two-time major champion Greg Norman. The retired golfer has been outspoken about the PGA Tour format.

The PGA Tour has banned and fined golfers like Dustin Johnson, Phil Mickelson and Bryson DeChambeau who joined the upstart golf league and are some of the biggest and most winningest players in the sport.

The probe is just the latest in the back-and-forth between the league backed by the Saudi government and the PGA Tour.

“We welcome good, healthy competition,” PGA Tour Commissioner Jay Monahan told reporters in late June when asked about the league. “The LIV Saudi Golf League is not that. It’s an irrational threat, one not concerned with the return on investment or true growth of the game.”

In a February letter to Monahan, Norman, who has won two major championships, chided the commissioner saying PGA Tour lawyers must be “holding their breathe.”

“But when you try to bluff and intimidate players by bullying and threatening them, you are guilty of going too far, being unfair, and you are likely in violation of the law,” Norman wrote.

LIV Golf has not responded to requests for comment by ABC News.

This week, the Open Championship, one of the four major golf championships, gets underway at St. Andrew’s in Scotland.

In 1994, the Federal Trade Commission looked into “unfair methods of competition,” that the PGA Tour was allegedly carrying out, but they were found to have not violated any federal laws.

ABC News’ Alexander Mallin contributed to this report.

Copyright © 2022, ABC Audio. All rights reserved.

(NEW YORK) — Here are the scores from Monday’s sports events:

MAJOR LEAGUE BASEBALL

AMERICAN LEAGUE
Kansas City 3, Detroit 1
Cleveland 8, Chi White Sox 4
Tampa Bay 10, Boston 5
Kansas City 7, Detroit 3
Texas 10, Oakland 8

NATIONAL LEAGUE
Pittsburgh 5, Miami 1
St. Louis 6, Philadelphia 1
NY Mets 4, Atlanta 1
San Diego 6, Colorado 5
Arizona 4, San Francisco 3

Copyright © 2022, ABC Audio. All rights reserved.

(NEW YORK) — Here are the scores from Sunday’s sports events:

MAJOR LEAGUE BASEBALL

INTERLEAGUE
Cincinnati 10, Tampa Bay 5

AMERICAN LEAGUE
Baltimore 9, LA Angels 5
Chi White Sox 4, Detroit 2
Kansas City 5, Cleveland 1
Minnesota 6, Texas 5
Houston 6, Oakland 1
Seattle 6, Toronto 5
Boston 11, NY Yankees 6

NATIONAL LEAGUE
Miami 2, NY Mets 0
St. Louis 4, Philadelphia 3
Atlanta 4, Washington 3
Pittsburgh 8, Milwaukee 6
Colorado 3, Arizona 2
San Francisco 12, San Diego 0
LA Dodgers 11, Chi Cubs 9

WOMEN’S NATIONAL BASKETBALL ASSOCIATION ALL-STAR GAME
Team 134, Team 112

Copyright © 2022, ABC Audio. All rights reserved.

(WASHINGTON) — Cherelle Griner said the letter President Joe Biden wrote in response to her wife, WNBA star Brittney Griner, amid her detention in Russia brought both of them “so much joy.”

“I believe every word that she said to him, he understood and he sees her as a person,” Cherelle Griner said at a press conference in Chicago on Friday afternoon. “And he has not forgotten her, which was her biggest cry in her letter.”

Griner, who plays for the Phoenix Mercury, personally reached out to Biden in a handwritten letter that the White House received on Monday, urging the president to help her get out of Russia where she has been detained for more than four and a half months.

“As I sit here in a Russian prison, alone with my thoughts and without the protection of my wife, family, friends, Olympic jersey or any accomplishments, I’m terrified I might be here forever,” Brittney Griner wrote to the president.

Secretary of State Antony Blinken said in a tweet on Thursday that the U.S. officials who attended the second day of Griner’s trial in Russia on Thursday delivered Biden’s letter to Brittney Griner.

White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre told ABC News on Thursday that the president was “deeply moved” by Griner’s letter, but wouldn’t say what the president wrote in his response.

“I’m grateful and I’m thankful that the administration that was the first one that BG ever voted for, took the time to see her as a person,” Cherelle Griner continued, “to see her in the midst of what she’s going through and to speak to me directly and let her know that they are exhausting all efforts to bring her home.”

Griner, a two-time Olympic gold medalist, was visiting Russia to play basketball in the off-season when she was detained at Sheremetyevo International Airport on Feb. 17 after being accused of having vape cartridges containing hashish oil, which is illegal in the country.

The U.S. government classified Griner’s case on May 3 as “wrongfully detained,” meaning the U.S. will more aggressively work to negotiate her release even as the legal case against her plays out, the State Department has said.

Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris called Cherelle Griner to discuss efforts to release the WNBA star, the White House said in a statement on Wednesday.

“The president called Cherelle to reassure her that he is working to secure Brittney’s release as soon as possible, as well as the release of Paul Whelan and other U.S. nationals who are wrongfully detained or held hostage in Russia and around the world,” the White House said in the statement.

Cherelle Griner was joined at the press conference by Rev. Al Sharpton, founder and president of the National Action Network and leaders from the WNBA, including Nneka Ogwumike, Los Angeles Sparks power forward and President of the WNBA Players Association and WNBA Players Association Executive Director Terri Jackson.

Sharpton called for Biden and Blinken to arrange a trip for faith leaders to see Griner in prison as part of a prayer visit.

“After speaking with her wife last week, I am deeply concerned for Brittney Griner’s physical, mental, and spiritual wellbeing,” Sharpton said in a statement on Tuesday.

Cherelle Griner thanked Sharpton for his support and thanked the WNBA for honoring and supporting her wife throughout her detention, including compensating her salary and bringing attention to her case on and off the court.

“It has just been overwhelming for my entire family — the joy of knowing that BG’s footprint was so big — that even in her absence, you still can’t miss her,” Cherelle Griner said.

Along with advocates, leaders and players in both the WNBA and the NBA have called for Griner’s release and raised awareness about her case.

The WNBA, which kicked off its 2022 season on May 6, is honoring Griner with a floor decal bearing her initials and jersey number (42) on the sidelines of all 12 WNBA teams.

Brittney Griner’s detention was extended repeatedly, most recently through Dec. 20, which is the expected length of her trial. If convicted, Griner, 31, faces up to 10 years in prison and also has a right to an appeal.

Brittney Griner said she “would like to plead guilty” Thursday morning on drug charges in a Russian court, saying that the vape cartridges containing hashish oil were in her luggage unintentionally. She said that she had no “intention” of breaking Russian law, adding that she was is in a rush and did not mean to leave the cartridges in her bag.

Brittney Griner is expected to appear in court on July 14 for the third day of her trial.

Calls to free Brittney Griner escalated following the release of U.S. Marine veteran Trevor Reed last month, who was freed from a Russian prison as part of a prisoner exchange. Former Marine Paul Whelan has also been detained in Russia since 2019.

Reed’s family met with Biden after they protested outside the White House, but despite their outreach, Whelan’s family had not spoken directly with Biden until Friday. Whelan’s family voiced disappointment after Biden’s call with the Griner family, saying that they have not heard from the president and worry that Whelan would be forgotten.

Biden called Elizabeth Whelan, Paul Whelan’s sister, on Friday to reaffirm his commitment to bringing Paul Whelan home from Russia, according to a White House official.

“President Biden reaffirmed that he is committed to bringing Paul home as soon as possible, and the U.S. government will continue its efforts to secure the release of Paul as well as Brittney Griner and all other Americans who are held hostage or wrongfully detained around the world,” the White House official told ABC News. “The U.S. government will continue to be in regular contact with Paul’s family, and with the families of other Americans held hostage or wrongfully detained abroad, to provide support and assistance and keep them updated on efforts to secure the release of their loved ones.”

Asked by ABC News how the White House can assure Whelan’s family that he is not forgotten, Jean-Pierre said the administration wants to “assure” the Whelan and Griner families that Biden will use “every means that we have” to bring them home.

“Clearly, we cannot negotiate in public. That is not something that we’re going to do. But, we’re committed to making sure they all get home safely,” she said.

ABC News’ Justin Gomez, Cindy Smith, Tanya Stukalova, Kendall Ross, Shannon Crawford and Ben Gittleson contributed to this report.

Copyright © 2022, ABC Audio. All rights reserved.