Trump aide grilled on TV show
Unusually tense interview between Good Morning America’s Stephanopoulos and Sarah Huckabee
NEW YORK — George Stephanopoulos’ “Good Morning America” interview with White House spokesperson Sarah Huckabee Sanders on Monday is an instant milestone in the hostile relationship between the Trump administration and the media.
In the discussion about President Donald Trump’s weekend accusations — offered without proof — that former president Obama ordered Trump’s New York home wiretapped, Stephanopoulos repeatedly interrupted and stopped Sanders. It was a crackling exchange unusual for the generally happy terrain of network morning television.
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Stephanopoulos asked Sanders whether Trump accepted reports that FBI director James Comey had denied there was any wiretapping of Trump. Sanders said she didn’t believe he did, and started talking about wiretapping reports in other media outlets. “Sarah, I have got to stop you right there,” Stephanopoulos said. The stories she cited did not back up the president’s claims, he said.
Sanders said there was “wide reporting” suggesting that the administration could have ordered wiretapping. Stephanopoulos stopped her to note there was a report of a court-ordered wiretapping.
Stephanopoulos stopped Sanders again when she noted that the unsubstantiated report of a wiretapping order came under the Obama administration and that “all we’re asking is that Congress be allowed to do its job.”
“Hold on a second,” he said. “There is a world of difference between a wiretap ordered by a president and a courtordered wiretap by a federal judge.”
Noting that Obama’s representatives had all said there was no wiretapping, Stephanopoulos asked, “is the president calling all three of these people liars?”
Sanders said that he wasn’t. She said she considered it a double standard that the media does not believe Trump when he says nothing untoward had happened between him and Russia, while reporters accept denials by the Obama administration on the wiretap accusation.