Your bag is empty.
The press secretary who was never there is no longer there.
Stephanie Grisham was described by most reporters as a wisp, a ghost rarely seen who often vanished with but a breath. For nine months she haunted the White House but never conducted a press briefing. She didn’t appear in the briefing room at all, even when her boss did. She took a new job on Tuesday, leaving a White House in which she never showed up, on a day when no one was there.
According to the headline of a press release from the Office of the First Lady, “First Lady Melania Trump Announces New Announces New Chief of Staff [sic].” The announcement was so nice they had to type it twice.
Grisham’s feelings about leaving the job she never did are not for me to speculate on—nor do I much care. It’s just a wonder it took that long to move her back over to the first lady’s staff, where the pace is decidedly slower. Grisham was never the best match for a press secretary; then again, Donald Trump believes Donald Trump is the one who can best play such a role for President Donald Trump.
Trump has discovered the briefing room stage. He has always thought himself to be his own best press secretary anyway, so why should he give it up now? These days he exists only in the briefing room or at an on-camera event with the press pool.
Kayleigh McEnany, the new press secretary, is a 31-year-old highly educated public spokesperson with a background in the law who apparently “loves to argue.” Big deal. In my family this sentence would be cause to argue. Yet I was also told by a senior White House advisor, “She is one of the more dangerous individuals out there…. Give her a case to argue and she’ll relish the argument.” Her many critics say she doesn’t get her facts straight and comes off as condescending and arrogant. Those three traits make her an excellent hire in this administration.
Whether or not she ever gives a press briefing is another story. There are those who believe her energy will propel her into the briefing room and she’ll thrive, especially since she can think on her feet.
Others, including those far closer to the president than I am, believe the president will merely use her on television.
Grisham took a new job on Tuesday, leaving a White House in which she never showed up, on a day when no one was there.
Donald always wanted his show to be invulnerable to bad reviews. He got it with the arrival of COVID-19. The board of the White House Correspondents’ Association, after consulting with health officials, voluntarily limited press access to the president in the name of social distancing. It may have been the healthy thing to do, but there’s absolutely no doubt what else it did.
Trump got what he wanted—a small room, a few warm bodies—and he’s capitalizing on it. Lights, camera, Donny action! Today only a good dozen reporters and their support staff watch the daily national tragedy the fourth estate’s absence helped to create.
A little more than a month ago Trump was still holding court on the South Lawn with 100-plus reporters and technicians present. Today, the White House I’ve covered off and on since Ronald Reagan’s administration is gone. I hope it comes back.
The White House press offices are nearly empty. Each day the stalwart members of the press skeleton crew, those who put themselves at risk to tell the world what the president is doing, enter the White House after a newly added hurdle: the instant thermometer check. Step right up to the white tent outside the gate and someone with a smile behind a mask taps you on the head with a magic wand; if you are of the proper temperature you may pass. As I was having my head tapped on Tuesday, I was told that few if any have failed the test so far.
After that you go through the normal routine of metal detectors and Secret Service checks. Inside the grounds, you see a scattering of technicians in masks and gloves. Few but the press pool are there and most of them don’t come until a half hour or so before the scheduled briefing, which is always delayed. The magic-wand people make another appearance before the briefings, tapping heads and giving out colored stickers to the press members who pass their test a second time.
Some in the press wear masks; others do not. Some have colorful scarves and gloves, and everyone is trying to practice social distancing while doing their job. It’s difficult, odd and necessary. If I walk into a bank dressed like that, with a scarf and sunglasses, wearing rubber gloves and my black fedora, someone in security is going to get itchy.
The magic-wand people make another appearance before the briefings, tapping heads and giving out colored stickers to the press members who pass their test a second time.
Jonathan Karl, as president of the WHCA, has played a huge role in limiting the number of reporters covering the White House, as has the rest of the WHCA board. Karl has defended the move as the best way to help protect the health of some 500 reporters who cover the White House—and friends, he ain’t wrong. But Karl has also invited criticism by voluntarily limiting briefing-room access on a rotating basis to those organizations with assigned seats.
For some it smacks of favoritism or elitism, and the White House countered by issuing a “guest” invitation to favored outlet OANN, a cable news network with a right-wing bent—even on days when OANN isn’t in the rotation. The WHCA stated that such a move constituted a breach of the agreement between the White House and the WHCA to ensure a healthy work environment. It also took punitive measures against OANN, stripping it of workspace and pool access. It’s a punishment with no teeth, though, as long as the White House continues to invite OANN to the party.
Attorney Ted Boutrous recently filed a complaint with the Department of Justice about the White House move. That led to two days without OANN, pending the DOJ’s response. Government lawyers admitted that the administration showed favoritism but blamed the WHCA for the problem. OANN showed up again Monday.
Boutrous countered on April 8, saying, “The notion that the OAN correspondent was invited to the briefing as a ‘guest’ and not a reporter is flawed and misleading. Even if the press secretary on occasion invites ‘guests’ to the briefing room, the OAN reporter was not invited merely to observe as the press secretary’s aides, family or friends might. Instead, that correspondent was welcomed to actively participate in the briefing as a reporter and was given the opportunity to ask questions of the president.”
“You all always eat your own,” I was told with a smile.
Meanwhile, Trump recently added Karl to the list of reporters he has publicly berated in his press briefings, calling him a “third-rate reporter.” This is no doubt a response to Karl’s actions against the OANN and a slap at his recently published book, Front Row at the Trump Show.
Karl, who’s also ABC’s chief correspondent, courted his own controversy in his book when he publicly criticized CNN’s Jim Acosta, accusing him of “playing into the explicit Trump strategy of portraying the press as the opposition party.” Karl admonished Acosta for giving “speeches from the White House briefing room.” He told the Daily Beast he would defend to death Acosta’s right to report from the White House, “but I have some issue with the style in which he has done so.”
Trump, I was told by a senior administration official, loved watching the president of the WHCA attack one of his colleagues. “You all always eat your own,” I was told with a smile. So perhaps Karl was as guilty of playing into the president’s strategy as he accused Acosta of being—if not more so. But by last Friday it was apparent he had second thoughts. I watched Karl, ever the arbiter of taste, decorum and style, show up in the basement of the briefing room, walk to the CNN booth and tell Acosta how much he respected him and enjoyed his work. He mumbled something about being taken out of context and said how as soon as this was over Karl would get a drink with him.
Those looking to the new press secretary, the president or the reduced number of White House reporters to get straight answers will be disappointed.
Karl’s questionable sideshow antics help no one as the White House continues to promote misinformation—and with fewer people able to confront the president, it’s easier for Trump’s claims to get traction. Meanwhile, people in several states say they’ve tuned out Trump because they trust their state and local authorities more than the president during this crisis.
The real question is this: What can we as a nation learn from this crisis, and how do we apply it to our lives going forward? Those looking to the new press secretary, the president or the reduced number of White House reporters to get straight answers will be disappointed.
But the bigger point is the president puts us all in danger, and the limited number of reporters now covering him are no match for his unending eruption of lies. We have, to paraphrase Pink Floyd, taken a lead role in a cage.
The president remains a small man, and now he’s playing to a shrinking crowd, both in the White House and across the country. His megaphone is still huge, though, and during the pandemic, reporters can’t shirk their responsibility to call him out for his lies. But we need to be there to do it.
As Boutrous noted in his Wednesday letter to the DOJ, “We remain committed to protecting the role of a vigilant press in our society—a role particularly needed in a crisis such as the ongoing pandemic.”
It’s not hyperbole to say lives are at risk.