Transcripts For CSPAN Press Access To President Trump 20171029

Watch professor Allison Stanger at 8 00 eastern on cspans q a. White House Press Secretary Sarah Sanders sat down this week with members of the White House Press corps to discuss the Trump Administrations relationship with the media and the amount of access the media receives. Glennthe participants was thrush and april ryan from the American Urban Radio Networks. Posted by George Washington university, this is an hour and 45 minutes. Good evening, everybody. [applause] quite a crowd. And there is the overflow room. The school of media and Public Affairs at George Washington university. Whether you are in the room or joining us on cspan or Facebook Live or with streaming live streaming, it is a pleasure to have you. Connecta place where we complex, controversial, fascinating issues of the day with those who are shaping them. Our students, faculty and researchers. I am positively delighted to be partnering with margaret and the White House Correspondents Association for this event. Thank you for turning out tonight. I am president of the White House Correspondents Association. I do analysis for bloomberg and cnn. Its an incredible pleasure to get to spend time with you guys tonight. We represent the White House Press corps, 100 journalists. Whether they are print or tv or radio them online, photographers the cover the white house, and our job is to be a liaison between the press corps in the white house, to educate the public, to raise issues about access and make sure we can get as much of the information as possible to you, the public. We do scholarships. We do awards to honor great work in we champion the first amendment. This is an important time for the first amendment. We look forward to be able to bring you the voices of some of the people on the front lines to do this day in and day out. We will take your questions on issues and concerns you care about. Year awe have every student who has one of these White House Correspondent association scholarships. We support that student through their four years here. Dinner withtend the the president , assuming the president goes to the dinner, and spending time with the correspondence. Correspondents. This is timely and remarkable and fascinating. I was a White House Correspondent myself some years ago. I was very young correspondent. A kindergarten correspondent. I covered the Reagan White House and the bush white house, George Herbert walker bush white house. I have interviewed several president s. This presidency changes what we have seen in many ways. Trump was a disruptive candidate and is a disruptive president. And some of the challenges to covering the white house, criticisms on the fake news. I have also in news and shaped things of well. We will touch on that as well. Marget our work every day is about doing our job day in and day out. There are moments in a presidency, and tonight is one of those moments when it is about assessing where we have been, where we are going, and whether anything has changed and how. Frank our panel will join us in a moment. We will ask a question on a different topic of each member of the panel. Then we will open it up for a broader conversation. We will open it up for your questions later in the evening as well. This is a real discussion. Marget when that point in the night comes there will be microphones. You can spend the next hour thinking about what questions you would like to ask and we will give you some instructions later on. We do want to mention thanks to some of the folks that are former president s of the correspondent association. Thank you for being here tonight. We like to welcome all students, media, academic scholars and members of the public. Frank we look forward to it. It is ok to look at your phones as long as you dont do it too much. If you want to engage social oftrump on twitter and instagram. It in a fully respectful way. One of the things we have seen that is most under siege is the notion of civil discourse. We here at gw are very much wanting to stand for that. Serious, honest, direct engagement, but always civil and respectful. Marget tweet or snap away. Please keep enough of your attention focused to you can hear what is actually going on. Frank we are really looking forward to this conversation. We had a couple of drinks, nonalcoholic, yesterday. Where do we begin . A good place to begin with the with introductions. Shall we do that . It is my great pleasure to start our introductions with someone you know, even if you dont know him. You have probably seen him or someone playing him on saturday night live. Please welcome glenn thrush from the new york times. [applause] frank thank you. Our nextou also know guest from fox news and because President Trump feels safe and comfortable with him. He likes to engage with him. Please welcome john roberts from fox news. [applause] john just because i am trump bait. Frank you know our next guest because we are privileged to have her as one of our turgor fellows. She spends time with faculty and others. She is wellknown to millions of americans for her many years at the white house. April ryan is a White House Correspondent with American Urban Radio Networks and an analyst with cnn. April ryan. [applause] frank do i get one . [laughter] panelist willxt succeed me next summer and also the chief washington and White House Correspondent for yahoo , olivier knox. [applause] frank how many students in the room . Any Political Science majors in the room . Anybody taking a course in Political Science . This person needs no introduction but we will do it anyway. She has a professor of Political Science. She has written about the presidency, congress, legislative gridlock. For next focus on the federal reserve. Her next book is on the federal reserve. [applause] last but not least it is a little intimidating to look at the room like this and a panel like this and think you are the representative of the Trump Administration. We know she is more than capable of doing a great job tonight. We want to thank her very much for her participation. Sarah huckabee sanders, white House Press Secretary. [applause] frank before you sit down that did not take long. Fascinated about why you came here and what it is you want to be a will to talk about. Maybe you should ask that question in about an hour and a half after this is over. Forums like this are important. The ability for the administration to be open, transparent, answer questions is very important part of my job. I tried to do that everyday. I am hoping maybe this crowd is a little nicer than the one i sometimes speak with. A few of my friends are back here. This is a great opportunity to talk about some of the things we have done over the last year and hopefully have a friendly and fun backandforth conversation. Frank we want to understand how you go about your job, cap give you your job and how your boss is doing his job. Im looking forward to hear in your response. Sarah good, i have time to think on those. Marget we got as close as we could do about a year since the historic election last november. November 8, President Trump and you will be somewhere in the middle of a 12date trip across trip across asia. The political landscape, to the way journalists and president s interact. And perhaps some comparisons between the campaign and the way President Trump has governed. I am very interested for gearin inherent about that. I am very interested in gearing about that. Hearing about that. [applause] to getwe will take turns the conversation going and then we will open it up. The audience will join us in the questioning of it later. Sarah, lets start with you. We are taking stock of things. The president made big and disruptive promises as a candidate. Heot of the promises he made said would be quick or easy. Obamacare,epealing tax reform, infrastructure. He has had a lot of trouble with each. In thinking about that and where he goes, this is the question. It revolves around priorities. Secretary mnuchin said last week the tax reform was the top reality. Corey lewandowski was on campus and set of donald trump does not build a wall, he will not get reelected. That should be top priority. Republicansl of shows their top priority was repealing and replacing the Affordable Care act. 53 said that was extremely important. What does the president vicki couldve done there from the to get any of these things done, and what is his top priority now . Sarah i think one of the reasons donald trump is president is because there is such a frustration with the way washington functions. I think we have seen a lot of that over these first nine months in office. You have so many things get lost in the process. It is very hard to push things through, regardless of whether or not you have a republican majority. Particularly when it is a narrow majority. Bigakes it tough to enforce and bold change like donald trump and like to do. We are making a lot of progress. Maybe not as fast as certainly i think the president wants and not as much as america once. I think america wants. That is the Reason Congressional polling numbers are so low. There is such a frustration that they dont have the ability to get a lot done. The biggest priority is tax reform. We are in the heart of that. I think we will get that done by the end of this year and i think a historic tax cut the president has proposed and is pushing through will be a massive change to our economic system. I think it will empower the economy in a new way through these historic tax cuts, help middleclass families, and something i think we will see happen in that couple of months. Frank i just want to ask one mini followup. He said is the Reason Congress numbers are so low. Is that why his numbers are so low . Sarah i will take the president s numbers over congress any day. One of the reasons you have President Trump as is because he is not your typical politician. They were looking for someone to come in and change washington, change the status quo and he has done that. I dont think anyone could argue he hasnt been somebody who has been disruptive to the way the system normally operates. Does that mean we are getting everything done on day one . No, but we have gotten a lot of things done in short order. Isis is on the run. The economy is stronger than it has been in decades. Unemployment at a 16year low. A lot of these things he has been able to do more in those eight months, particularly what it comes to things like strengthening the economy, like the defeat of isis and the position we are in far more than obama did in eight years. Those are big steps in the right direction. Frank we will come back to all of that, im sure. Marget mr. Thrush what she said. Year has trumps first been marked by a lot of wellknown internal competitions. Everyone from michael flynn, jim comey, the hhs secretary, sean spicer, steve bannon. I feel like i might be forgetting a couple of people. There are a couple of remaining cabinet advisors or top advisers who have been under threat of will hewont he. How, other than the kind of political reportage, how has that affected the management of the executive branch and the process of governance in the early months of this white house . Glen the first thing i would like to do this thing sarah for coming. I know it is difficult to be outnumbered. Sarah kind of outnumbered . Glen incredibly cool she would come here and submit herself to this sort of thing. Frank it is just a conversation. Think part of the thatem has been the fact they are learning on the job. A lot of disruption we refer to, and there is no question the mood in the country are restive. Nt is i dont think people wanted it shaken up this way. You see that reflected in a lot of numbers that shows the president lost a significant amount of support from om heendents, without wh would not have been elected president. [laughter] check your phone. My phone is dead. It makes you even more questionable. [laughter] glenn i will just let that one go. I think in general part of the issue is this guy is learning on the job. He had no experience in this. I think part of the problem is his brand precludes him from you cant necessarily do what a lot of president s in this say ion due which is to am ramping up. That reflects itself in the way that, with all the respect, some of the communication comes through. With general kelly a couple of days ago what was noteworthy was not that he made what appears to be a significant error in facts about this congresswomans characterization, the conversation and the characterization of the gaveesswomans speech she at the opening of the fbi office a couple of years ago. The fact that there was not an immediate attempt to deal with that. Clearly the general misremembered about what occurred. That is a fairly easy matter of fact a clear up. I will not name the Senior Administration official who sent this to me, but early on during the presidency, probably february or march i dont think i made an error in a story but there was a failure to communicate. I did not yet someone to comment on deadline. They called me up to complain about it. Then i said to them, i am really sorry about this. Then that person said dont apologize. It is a sign of weakness. I dont view apologizing or admitting error or that you made a mistake is a sign of weakness. It is a sign of strength. I think in terms of the president and his Approval Ratings in his interactions with all his branches of government and the iraqi people at large he would be doing the American People at large he would do himself a favor if he admitted everyone is capable of seeing that he is learning on the job. Roberts, talk politics today. Corker, dave bob haveert, russ lightman either announce retirement or been defeated in a special primary race. Our boss and former advisor to the President Trump steve bannon spoke of a season of war against the gop establishment. What impact from your perspective, and you know this very well marget that is not a joke about your age. Just because a cover the first roosevelt presidency. [laughter] does the ofimpact people have on the Republican Party and conservativism . John i think the ultimate effect remains to be seen. Steve bannon does really push a lot of alternate candidates. Going into the midterm elections, i think they could have a dramatic effect on the Republican Party. Mitch mcconnell thinks it is a bad idea to float the kind of candidate steve bannon is behind. He said the other day for the president again on sunday that his goal was to get candidates that can be elected and therefore maintain a majority in congress. I think the biggest problem for the Republican Party is they have been screaming long and loud, give us the house, give us the senate, give us the white house and you will see things get done. But things in congress have not gotten done yet. The president has suffered a stinging defeat twice. There are a lot of people in this country that are thankful that did not get done, but if you are a republican and you want to get elected in 2018 or a republican president and you and to get things done, you are looking at that saying we gave the keys to the kingdom and 99 getting anything done. You have been promising for the past several years the first thing you would do when he got the majority was to repeal and replace obamacare. They have run three elections on that and did not get it done. After all those show votes they took into congress, we will vote yes. When the rubber that the road they choked. A lot of republicans are looking at that and saying we keep sending Unit Congress on the promise you will get something done and you dont do it. Then all these alternative candidates start to surface more. Many of those are people that Mitch Mcconnell said will not get elected. The Republican Party could end up shooting itself in the foot because he could not get done what it promised to get done. It is a little early to see the full effect. April covers urban communities across the United States. It is a big focus of your reporting. April among other things. Marget if you were to highlight one or two policy issues you think of have the biggest impact on urban communities, which ones would you highlight . Are those the same issues that got the most coverage . April no. What we are gearing in the news affecting the urban community this president has a major microphone to write the narrative saying things about the flag and the soldiers of this country. Areho are taking challenging the system that is been a problem for a long time when it comes to police and mass shootings. That issue still has yet to be addressed. We know the president , when he was president elect and also when he was a candidate he was supporting policing. Supports community releasing to weed out that policing. Think about then candidates from running for the oval office. He was talking about an innercity fix. I asked him about that and he talked about issues of crime. It talked about issues of health care, education. I asked him about the they did have a meeting. A lot of those issues are yet to be dealt with. When it comes to issues of crime, there is a big problem. The Congressional Black Caucus is talking about this right now. The Trump Administration now is dealing with or in the midst of working out this plan that the cbc considers hooveresque. If you are black identifying and gettingng, they are now a file. That is very hooveresque. When it comes to education, lets talk about hbcus that are flattering. Historically black colleges and universities. None of them are celebrating 105 nine of them are celebrating 150 years. 150 years ago was two years after the emancipation proclamation, when black people were told they were free. Not go me but we could to schools with white people. Betsy devos at the whole thing wrong. We could not go to schools with white people. They were built brick by brick to educate their future. That was not meant to play with this or have it floundering. Many in the Africanamerican Community are upset because that is one of the two pieces for africanamericans to go to middle income status. There are a lot of issues on the table. I am waiting and listening for some of those issues to come around. Education, crime. We have not heard about the crime yet. And the Affordable Care act. Aca. Yes, it has problems. Aca, the Affordable Care act, that the republicans gave to president obama and he embraced. The issue was trying to help with insurance. Yes, you had high deductibles and some issues. There is strong concern in the black community that with this on round of executive orders what is to be done, it will be the least of these. When it comes to issues in urban america the jury is still up but it does not look good right now. Sarah i would just like to clarify something on hbcus and education. President trump has done more in terms of elevating hbcus. He moved the office back into the white house so it has been empowered and a greater level, given a bigger platform and that of having it house at the department of education. They committed to funding. There is no flattering on that part. One of the things that is very helpful is the idea of school choice, which is very popular with an urban communities because it allows students he has been a champion for that, as is betsy devos. I think those are ways we are taking bigger steps. This was not a problem created overnight. We are not going to be able to fix it overnight. We are taking very big steps in the right direction to move that ball forward and to empower those communities and do more and open up that conversation. April if i may, the hbcu president s were told when they ofe in at the end february by steve bannon to get them a list. Pell grants, which they did get through congress. Sarah which the Trump Administration supported. April that is true. Then they also had they asked for a onetime lump sum of 25 billion. And then with a hurt the president said about the budget, and it could be unconstitutional because of race issues, the president did say that. What did he say . Frank do you have a response to that . Sarah we can come back to all of that. The broader point is that you want to launch these very generic attacks against this administration when we have done a lot of the things. Did everything get done on that list . No, but several items did. We are working to complete more of the things on that list. April i did not attack. This is civil discourse. I was laying out what i was asked to lay out. You have policy pronouncements and you have details. You have interpretations of the same. Lots to pursue. We will not get to everything tonight. We heard from sarah earlier and dead on, this president john you were talking about this. This president was elected as an expression of discontent at the way washington as the hate. If you want to burn down the house, you hire an arsonist. Donald trump said we have to bring this house down. He said i will drain the swamp. How is he doing . Swamp drained . Nearly as well as he is allowing a lot of systematic regulations. I connect these ideas. You go back to early april. The director of omb Mick Mulvaney identified one core principle which was removed the influence of lobbyists on policy. His formere seen Trump Campaign manager you to start or join major lobbying firms. Have seen a lot of policy i want to connect these two ideas. No, the swamp is not trained. You would not see one of the signal successes of the Trump Administration. It does not get as much coverage as the latest tweet, but its very important for this administration. The methodical rollback of executive regulation. Marget lets talk about what it means for President Trump to be a republican. Had a lot of tension with the republicancontrolled congress. At the same time he seems to be working towards a goal without republican congress. One, attempting to get things accomplished that fit his agenda. Two, trying to shape it Republican Party a little bit more into his vision. I wanted to ask you what you think that tension exists. Thean as a republican, but President Trump as a republican or as a thirdParty Candidate or a no Party Candidate . I definitely see him as republican. The matter what the policy issue is or the direction he wants to move the party, he runs at the end of the day on his name and the republicans are after the name regardless of the policies. Is ank the problem is fraction republican majority and ever here before the election. We did not notice them so much in the minority because they were not responsible. Maraget in a position of control they have to deal with a polarized system. Two parties disagree about the problems are, what the solutions are. It is a small majority, it is fractured, and they are looking to the president to pave the way forward. President s can play because they have the broad, public stature to do that. You done at the via policy wonk, but you have to use your bully pulpit to maintain the partys position. Fellow members of your party, even if they disagree with you on policy, they need to be convinced that because you are behind it they should get behind it. But you have to choose an issue, choose a position. Many lawmakers, republican lawmakers are not quite sure what the president stands on any given issue. That is complicated, building a majority. A majority of them have to be built. Maraget do you think any republican president had one of the other 16 emerged of the nominee, any republican president would have actually had a bit of trouble governing as a leader of this Republican Party . Sarah b. there are certain fractures that would have emerged. Repeal and replace. Tax reform. I think you would be seeing similar issue. The question is could a different president have set the agenda and stuck to the agenda and make clear with all resources behind that agenda . And did they have the public stature outside washington . Call theave what we power to persuade . Your persuasion as president to fentanyl people in washington see you. Wins are reasons to get behind you. Do you reach out . That will build public prestige and that is what president s can use. We can imagine another morelican may be making progress but still with a fractured majority. Frank a lot of you have talked about the different nature of this president , the presidency, some of the political decisions that exist, the swamp they came up against. You talked about being new at this. Obviously donald trump was not in government. We talk about things that had been done. In looking forward and thinking about what has been done over the past, what has the president learned from this year. How do you see him taking those lessons and applying them to be more effective at getting some of these things done that have not been done . Broadening his face as opposed to merely playing to his base . How would you assess some of what you have seen and what needs to play out . Thats a lot of questions. She is used to that. Sarah i get that all the time. Be onk a lot of it would the Relationship Development side. I wask he has done going to go the opposite way. Particularly on the Foreign Policy stage, i think he has done a good job of developing relationships with a lot of key partners and allies. Particularly when you look at the asia trip we are getting ready to go on. He has developed strong relationships with abe, xi, a lot of the leaders that really are helping grow the amount of pressure being put on north korea, which is one of the greatest threats our country has faced today. Frank im talking about being legislatively effective in washington. Sarah i did not know you are speaking specifically about legislative issues. A little brought on lessons learned. Legislatively to take a bigger role of engagement. In health care, he did towards the end. You are seeing that happen more with the tax reform, tax cut plan that is being enacted very much forward leaning. Far more engaged. Early on in laying out the parameters, laying the foundation of what he would like to see. And the plan working with members of congress to develop that plan. And helping drive that through to completion. I think you look at the process from healthcare, the process put in place for passage of tax cuts. I think those are pretty different approaches and certainly i think we are seeing more success to date on the momentum and forward progress on the tax cuts. I think the president discovered over the last nine months he cant rely on members of is a party to get things done. If you reaches out to the democrats, you might get a couple of things done but he has to be realistic. They will stick a knife in his back the moment they get the opportunity to on a number of different issues. Frank what about the republicans . Democrats stick it in the front. It comes down to a handful of people. It is come down to rand paul, continues to refuse or vote for anything that involves a . You know Susan Collins that stands on principle. John mccain who stands on principle, and Lisa Murkowski is flexible depending on if she can get the process she wants. It is down to just a handful of people blocking things from getting done in the senate. They are standing on their principles. Rand paul is sitting on the principle of i want to get reelected. The other ones probably could be convinced to do it if they are given the right set of parameters in order to be comfortable. Ma right or wrong . And i right or wrong . Sarah possibly. Some are principle. Some are posturing. Maraget the president tells us how great things are. I would to hear from you. There are always positives and negatives to every presidency. The defining moments in these nine months. If you can give us a look into was this week a defining moment . Sarah this week . I would not say this is the defining moment. Moment . Defining sarah i would not characterize it as that. The media was to create a narrative that i dont necessarily agree with. Wants to create a narrative. There is a desire to make this into a situation of an attack point on the president. I dont necessarily agree with that process at all. I think in terms of the negative, i think the biggest negative would be congress inability to do their job. It is their job to legislate. It is the president s job to be the executive, layout the priorities in the principles, use the bully pulpit which he has done. To johns point you have a few People Holding up a lot of progress. To me, that is the greatest negative. Congressinability to step up and do their job. Particularly members campaigning on a lot of these things over the last seven years. Some of them even longer. Now they have the opportunity to do some big things and i hope they take it. April will there be an apology . Frank how easy is it to use the bully pulpit . Not averse to beating up on congress. I think it is a fair thing to do. We are talking about a presidency in the first nine months that has not functioned as a normal presidency. We see hundreds of positions unfilled. All you have to look at to understand what is happening is the president s policy page on his campaign website. You can continue to look at and it will say 404 error. The president did not release anywhere nea the ce near the sort of policy proposals i probablyture to say any candidate in the entire risk or any recent race. There was not a policy focus at all. How reporting has shown exhaustively he was uninformed about basic facts about the Health Care System in this country. I have interviewed dozens of people who attest in good faith affect the president was not appear in a lot of these policy discussions. Conversant with the tax issue because it is something he is more familiar with. But on areas such as health care and entitlement reform and the budget, he has not been as conversant and also not as studious as previous president s. This is not an opinion. It is based on a certain volume of reporting. We were having a back and forth between april and sarah about urban america. I spent my career covering neighborhoods in new york city. I am not as familiar with the black college issue, but i can talk about the Community Development block grant program. Really the principal means by which the federal government is able to ameliorate poverty in terms of housing and Committee Services community services. Zeroed it outney this year. Congress will definitely restore it, likely to par. In terms of his commitment to urban america, i think the Community Involvement block grant, people like him scott, republican senator from South Carolina has identified that as one of the defining issues. While we talk about a tremendous amount of dysfunction in congress, and they certainly did not deliver desperately lowly paul ryan more than Mitch Mcconnell. Paul ryan set the order of battle with reince priebus, the first chief of staff. I would say a fair amount of responsibility in terms of this gridlock and dysfunction rests on the president. I would like to throw out a question about u. S. Leadership in the world and if or how the president s approach to that or take on that has changed since he first took office. We could be talking about global interest in, or his instinct for engaging with foreign leaders and allies he has made. Testing of boundaries he has done. Jumping around sarah it seems you always start with me. Maraget i want you to frame this for us. During the campaign we thought about him as a domestic focused president who had a couple of international issues, primarily security and trade and job creation. His focus would be at home. In the spring we saw with the chinese leader xi at maralago, a turn towards understanding there was real leverage and power in this kind of relationships. You are so much more on the inside. Can you talk about the evolution in terms of his thinking about what is possible with foreign relationships . Sarah ultimately there are different aspects of the foreign relationships. One that you mentioned is trade. The president is focused on making sure the trade deals we have are good deals for american workers. I think he strongly feels that in the past a lot of the deals have benefited other countries over the american worker. He is trying to put in ephesus on negotiations to make sure whatever trade deals we have in place benefit the worker. One of the other big places is putting pressure on countries like north korea. I think he has done a great job of developing relationships and strengthening existing relationships that we have with the allies and partners like south korea, like china, like japan to help put additional pressure on north korea. I think that is been a very big focal point. We have seen him step up with more comprehensive plans to address afghanistan and iran. Not just looking at one aspect. Interagency process and with a number of stakeholders to really bring about a more holistic approach to deal with places like afghanistan and iran instead of looking at individual issues. That first trip a couple of you may have been on, his first foreign trip, that was very historic in saudi arabia and the speech he gave to the 68 muslim majority countries. Bringing a lot of those individuals in to talk about working together to combat terrorism. That was a historic moment, something that had not been done before. I think a lot of that was a great transition point for the administration and certainly a big powerpoint of the first few months of him being in office was that speech in that moment and the collective countries coming together for the first time to say we will Work Together and look for ways to defeat terrorism. Hink that is probably certainly a major moment and his presidency up until this point. Maraget russia has not enough for a number of reasons. Just what toe that do with those relationships, how hard to take them and for what purpose is still something that he is testing and trying to figure out. It is a twoway street. These other leaders are trying to define them as well. Back in march i talked with folks at 12 embassies in d. C. Major allies from around the world. The most consistent thing i heard was sure, we can get people on the phone. We have a really good conversation about what to do in afghanistan. At the end, they say the president has not weighed in. That is changing a little bit now. What is happening is the president committed himself to actions that are not easily reversed. We are talking about committing troops to afghanistan. We are not talking about a tweet. We are talking about this complicated puzzle of north korea. Allies and i would guess adversaries are taking a different measure of this president. Also because this white house is not as chaotic as it used to be. It is night and day between january 20 and today on every front. Or even june 20 really. [laughter] ask you would like to to share some of your impressions with the audience. Reportedow you see and on the white house, and the relationship between the press and the white house. Contentiouso very for a period of time. It has changed immensely since sarah took over. We all get through the daisies and watch the butterflies. The white house does work a lot better than it did. Here is a big contrast between the sean spicer era and the Sarah Sanders era. Not onerah took over person has peddled me a story about sarah. That was not true under sean. I cannot describe the garbage they were paddling to a lot of us on this panel on personal stuff, trying to undermine him. That hasnt happened under sarah. A credit to you on that. It operates very differently. Frank as the relationship with the press improved . If i can put you on the spot as a bloomberg correspondent and the white house cour Correspondents Association president. Maraget part of it is sarahs approach is been to what the president let the president approach the media as he instinctively wants to. There is a difference between the president s relationship with the media and the white house staffs relationship. The press staffs relationship. You can tell me if you think that is fair or not. The temperature is certainly down. In the opening months of the administration, to show he was he during the briefings made it seem like it was completely antagonistic and on fire at all times, and burning, and smoke, and people running around. Because it was. [laughter] margaret it was certainly more chaotic than it is now. Is always since the beginning of the administration, there were briefings. People have access. People could ask questions. It was certainly more confrontational. April sarah comes to the podium. We have had our little backandforths. Sarah i think i am winning her over. April no, you are not. [laughter] [applause] you picked up the mantle and you charged in. I understand as a woman in that you, in who you work for, have to come out and show you take no prisoners. You do that. Adversarialndly, relationship. Sarah i should do that. April i have seen you give and take. I am not giving you flowers or anything whether you what did you say . Ok. What i am saying is i understand being a woman in this maledominated world. Monday, it was like come to the rose garden now. It is not as organized as we might like or they might like. I hear you. Margaret you really are the most important answer here. What is your take on what your job is . You work for the president , taxpayers. You are supposed to be facilitating conversations with journalists. How do you do your job as press secretary . Sarah the number one job i have is to come out and provide the most Accurate Information i can at that moment. To give the most full picture i andof the process, policy, position of the administration. That is what i try to do every day. Sometimes i do it better than others. Sometimes i think it is less tense than others. Some of that is based on the news that is taking place, if it is a more controversial topic. The new leave early. Thenn you leave early you leave early. Sarah people may not see that whether or not i made i may be at the podium, i am in the office for 15 hours in the day. A lot of individuals may not ask their questions in the briefing room, but i talked to them on the phone, by emailed. John sits outside my office a. Ouple hours a day is that we provide information in a number of ways. They thatat the part should be more focused on is helping, giving information to the American People directly and being able to answer questions so they can hear the answers because they do not have the option to come by my office as frequently to get some of that information. We try to be very accessible. I think that is something that quite a few outlets have reported. They are more accessible in terms of press interactions and you have seen in previous administrations. Something that we try to put a big focus on in our office. To pretend like they are not tensions would be silly. That is not new to this administration. White house, press corps, whatever administration is in power always has tensions because we have very different jobs to do. Whether or not we can Work Together better than other times , that certainly happens. I do think there is a greater hostility than i have seen in this administration than previously. Towards the administration. You see that reflected in the numbers and the coverage. Last week, there were reports that came out from independent study groups. 93 of the coverage of the administration was negative and 7 positive. The first nine months of the obama administration, it was 40 six 40 versus 60 . Frank olivia, do you want to address that . One of the things i would is part ofs that it a greater media ecosystem. When you are writing about the agencies and other places, the whole package does not start and stop with us. It is important to take a theder view than just narrow feuding between the press corps and the white house. I think a lot of fights in previous administrations i went nose to nose with people who had that job before. Asked one whether they were psycho or just stupid. Sarah im glad i have not gotten there yet. There is a chance. Whether thatis figure you said is the result of extremely nature different nature of the administration. I do not know how i weigh the two of those things. The use of twitter to drive the news cycle, there is a fair omg on our side of the business. Some people screaming unprecedented and unbelievable. Say of the older folks will every president has done Something Like that. I am thinking about asking the ambassadors to submit their resignation letters. This is not a mold breaking administration, but i do not know that the facts are necessarily accurately presented. I think that it is not even the nature of the question, it is the way that a question is asked area so often, i feel like the question comes from a place like an accusation, instead of looking for information. It is more like you are a horrible person, tell us why. They actually think i am a horrible person. Think frank that has always been the tone of the white house. You have covered other president s. The white house is a political circus. We talk about policy and the defense department. , differenty focused sort of questioning. The white house is a political place. They always have a political town. Sarah there is a difference between a political town and a hateful tone. Frank you think it is a hateful tone . All the time. I am not trying to generalize the entire press corps. , i can assure you. You look at reporters, not just some of their public statements through their stories, but some of their twitter statements. You look at some of their feeds and you cannot read through a and say this person absolutely hates everything about what we are doing. It is hard to come to any other conclusion than that when you look at so many of the personal. Pinions injected that is a dangerous place at times. Important to note that President Trump has made battling the press the centerpiece of his lyrical career. He did it during the campaign trail, with individual reporters , it is a centerpiece. I would disagree profoundly with sarah. No one hates anyone. Speak. Ng i cannot from my mellowk self. I do nott made remember the timing of this. Bannon with the opposition party. Come on. This is a president who has a political strategy. We know this area we know this. Because of his high negative ratings, which were present during that campaign, his istics strategy actually entirely intuitive and smart. Genius. It worked. He needs an opponent. This is a politician who does not do particularly well standing alone on center stage. He performs best as implementation as a politician. However next is going to come up against him, he chooses opponents areas Mitch Mcconnell is a target. Opponents. Mitch mcconnell is a target. He requires that. Central, opponent. To cannot and answer questions, it was to harangue us about making a factual error, not giving anyone a chance to ask questions. I think that was at the behest of the president of the United States. That tells you. This is not hard. His initial word. In praise of sarah in the way she has handled the room, i give her incredibly high marks in lowering the temperature. The communication director has also played a productive role. This is emanating from the president s political strategy. Frank you are a political scientist. Take a step back. My only experience is from saturday night live. Sarah b it is pretty clear that the stakes are huge. It is in normal sleep powerful in terms of the global position in the world. He can be a force for good and a both arenas. In it makes sense that there is this type of conflict going on. We expect the press the press to play that role of accountability. I cannot speak to the debate that goes on, but someone has to ask. The press is being partisan on one side or the other. The stakes are huge because there is such disagreement about what was a problem and what the outcomes are. Polarizingntensely election. A lot of big claims made and a lot of promises made. It is the role of the press to hold them accountable for what promises are being made. President has used the press. He has tapped in by doing that integrate a deep well of resentment among many people in the country who believe that the press is biased against all republicans. If you are a liberal, everything you say is truth. If youre a republican, everything you say is a lie. Bushs it was george second inauguration. Donald trump came up to me and said he people do not know what is going on in my part of america. You tell what is going on in the center part of the country. Comeattitude is going to home to roost. It took a while, but it came home to roost in 2016. I went to so Many Campaign events across america. When President Trump singled out the media, he had the entire room with him. Becomeople were going to violent against members of the press, which is something that should never happen in this country. Andee that in dictatorships places in the world that are very dark corners. That should never happen in the United States of america. All due respect, he went too far in what he did. He does reflect a very deepseated resentment among millions of people in this country for the press. In a couple minutes we are going to move to the question and answer section of tonight. I wanted to circle back to an answer but i started to give. Whether thingss had changed. I think the temperature that you bring to the debate certainly has changed since the opening months of the administration. President trump continue to greet me in the morning by twitter. It feels personal. It has intensified. Us, we arer many of constantly weighing whether or , talk about that or write about it. Is it a distraction or is it important to defend the principles of what we do . For me, i have been a generalist for a quarter of a century. It is funny because i am only 30. I do not know how that happened. I work really hard at getting it right and being fair and listening to all sides of the story. Nobody likes to be attacked when they care about being perceived as fair and openminded. Father is gone now. He escaped from bulgaria, a communist country. When i was growing up, debates were always about criticizing government and questioning authority, no matter what party the president or congress was controlled by. Greats one of the liberties of being an american is the question anybody in power. Buildinga foundational block for why i became a journalist. I think many of us worry that because there is some of this underlying distrust about the media, people did not know that about us. ,t is true that past president s we have always adjusted behind the scenes. In publix, the message has almost always been about, even though i hate these guys, what they do is really important and part of america. Because we do not hear that as much, we worry about some of the longterm costs. Sarah i think that goes both ways. Attacked more,en questioned more. I was called a liar by a Major Network in an official statement. I have been called outrageous things on air. It goes unquestioned. There is no pushback. Time and again. I think there has to be an appreciation for our side that we are working hard and putting in ours. We are doing the best we cant represent the administration. That is often overlooked. Frank does he want to be questioned . Does he want to be challenged . Sarah i think it is an important part of democracy. With that freedom comes a great deal of responsibility. You have to have a high level of responsibility to report Accurate Information. I think that is not done all the time. I have had conversations where i have been in a meeting that included five people. I talked to people to make sure i do not miss something. Go back to a reporter i talked to the other four people in the room. We all agreed that nothing similar to this took place. I have a source outside the white house, so i will run with it. We cannot can the compete against that. There is a real disservice on both sides. We had a meeting today in our things thatsh for come from the administration, particularly from the press office to be on the record. It is hard for us to argue that we want you guys to have on record sources if we are not going on the record. Sometimes the released us that is not necessarily on the record, but if it is not particularly a policy initiative, that should be on the record created the record. Frank so there will be more on the record . Sarah correct. More to do on the record, on camera briefings to allow that sense of access and transparency so that you have that. It goes both ways. I do not think we can be asked to constantly be out in the open and transparent and do something so forward leaning and always on the when we constantly have to compete with Anonymous Sources that were not in the room, part of the process. They can think of anything in the world they want to because they cannot prove the negative. If we have the compete with that constantly, that is a big disservice to the American People. Ite of the bigger outlets, is a problem. Anyone with a computer can be a journalist. Jugglee to constantly the differences of real journalism and not. The anonymous sourcing is a really big problem. We will turn to the floor. Helen thomas said everything comes to the white house. I want to go back to a comment you made about people making jobs or saying something. , of we ask questions of you course there are people there who ask questions towards your base. There are people who ask questions. When you look at that room, how do you determine which one is a negative, positive, and which one should i call on . Sarah i do not look at the room as negatives and positives. That is the wrong way to view the room. I look at it as an open book. I try to make my way around the room. I have people who come up to my office and say call on people on the left side of the room. Around amake my way mix of tv versus print, versus radio, versus online to give us left leaning, rightleaning publications. I do not think anyone can say i do not take tough questions. I call on a mix of everyone. I do not look at the room as negatives and positives. It is an open floor space. Everything is fair game. I do the best job i can to call on a variety of people and make , updated,i gave fair Accurate Information as much as i can. Frank who do you go to when you are looking for an escape hatch . Sarah definitely not john. John we do not want to name names here. Got trapped, she would go to somebody who knew about the wtl. I was one of the people. He would go to on a domestic story. He would look around the room. He would point me because he was going to get an iran story or a question about the european union. He knew he could get out of trouble on a domestic story with me. Brother and frank we should come to the floor now. We promised that. A few hands up already. Why dont we come down here. Why dont you move up to the aisle. Ang on to the mic for him let me ask you a favor. Keep your questions to questions, not speeches. Deep them as short as you can and will not have everybody answer everything so we can move as quickly as possible. Margaret if you have a question for a specific panelists, ask it quickly so it does not turn into a freeforall. Thank you so much. I am a visiting scholar. I work on u. S. President ial speech writing. In the last 30 years, the white house has developed a process that allows different departments to have a say and check the statement. That is because every word the president thinks has an impact on the world. Looks allow the different departments to resolve any outstanding issues before the public statements are made. Frank what is your question . President trump seems to be circumventing this mechanization through his speech. My question to the defense secretary is, how should foreign relate to President Trump speech . Are they public statements that the entire administration can end behind or are they personal views of the individual, donald trump . The question for the other members is how do you relate to President Trump . Sarah they are public statements by the president area and it is an important told that tool that he has. You do not always have to like it or agree with it, but there is something really unique that this president and the fact that he talks directly to the American People. It does not come through a filter of any individuals or myself. It is a direct line of communication and a way for him to tell america and the rest of the world or he is on a particular issue or topic at any given moment. That is something that people should be celebrating. The idea that you have somebody who is so candid and authentic. That is one of the reasons why he became president. They wanted somebody who was not scripted every minute of the day and was not a programmed robot, but somebody who was very authentic. You get that in President Trump. That is one of the ways he does that. There are certainly upsides to the tweets. There is a mantra. Nothing is agree to until everything is agreed to. Negotiate a complex deal and then agree on it. By tweeting about the 401k, he took that off the agenda. Negotiators wanted to include that tax provision, but it up edd did the ability upened nded the ability. I think america appreciates it a lot more than closed door meetings. It certainly outweighs the negative. Frank the praise that sarah used was that it at any given moment. Tuesday he might say they were wonderful and quality of. One of the jobs as reporters is tracking those statements. Having a bumblebee in a jar and you open the jar and the bumblebee goes around. Sometimes you are seeing these on twitter. Hift that is hard for us to wrap our brains around and report. Day he is fine. How you process that as a reporter . That is certainly a historic development. A question from this side of the room, if we can. Sarah it is not as easy as it looks. Margaret second row, woman. Im a student at gw. There is a continuing notion that President Trump has more sensational headlines overshadow other news such as the nfl debacle overshadowing Hurricane Maria and north korea. How do you address this claim and how you pick the stories to cover . We just cover it all. When youre drinking from the firehose, you get a very big mop and sponge as you try to digest it all. This is a president who has a background in reality television. He is a very controversial figure and has been for his entire life areas controversies entire life. I took special note the other day. The president talked for 35 minutes, which i think was a recordsetting. He really wanted to talk about puerto rico. The reason he wanted to talk about puerto rico was there were some sensitivities that maybe he needed to get the story out there a little more against the opposition of how he believes this administration has responded to puerto rico. Being a person forged in controversy, controversies will always arise. The heat is what rises. Loves he loves the nfl story. He tried to own an nfl franchise. It is part of the culture. With the president , he typically works on four or five different levels. It has to be a combination of political, personal. There is a policy consequence for his agenda. Rex tillerson, you get undercut in negotiations. There is an obsession with the media. No offense to any of you, but you act like you love to talk about policy. You have the platform. You are very able to steer the conversation to more substantive policy topics. When it comes to the economy, the stock market is at a alltime high. Unemployment at a 16 year low. Isis is on the run. There are some major things. Deregulation at an unprecedented 1000 relationsy cut back that have allowed Companies Creating jobs the rope. That is not get talked about. When you look at what americans actually care about, it is economy, jobs, national security. What the media covers is palace intrigue