Los Angeles Times

White House’s ‘fiery’ Psaki ending tenure

Exit of press secretary, a well-known face, could complicate how Biden’s message gets out at a critical time.

- By Will Weissert Weissert writes for the Associated Press.

WASHINGTON — Jen Psaki had been White House press secretary less than two weeks when a reporter asked whether Twitter’s ban of Donald Trump had made President Biden’s life easier.

“We don’t spend a lot of time talking about or thinking about President Trump here,” she responded, then added for emphasis: “Former President Trump.”

It was an early indication of what was to come with this press secretary. Her briefings were profession­al and typically congenial but could turn pointed in a hurry. The sessions were informativ­e but generally lacked the drama to draw big ratings on cable TV.

Psaki, whose last day is Friday, has answered reporters’ questions nearly every weekday of the almost 500 days that Biden has been in office. That makes her a top White House communicat­or and perhaps the administra­tion’s most public face after only the president and Vice President Kamala Harris. Her departure could complicate how Biden’s message gets out at a critical time for him, at least in the short term.

“Anybody with a brain would want her to stay because she’s so good,” said Martha Joynt Kumar, a political science professor emerita at Towson University and director of the White House Transition Project, a nonpartisa­n group that tries to help streamline the transfer of power from one administra­tion to the next.

Succeeding Psaki is Karine Jean-Pierre, the first Black woman and openly LGBTQ person to be White House press secretary. She takes over as the administra­tion is navigating inflation and Russia’s war with Ukraine, and as the Democratic Party is bracing for a tough November election that could erase its control of Congress.

The White House says Jean-Pierre, who has been Psaki’s chief deputy, will bring strong personal expertise and personalit­y to the briefing room. She knows Biden well and has been a longtime advisor.

“I’ve had the honor of working with many White House press secretarie­s and no one has done the job as well as Jen Psaki,” White House Chief of Staff Ron Klain, a veteran of the Obama and Clinton administra­tions, said in a statement. “I will miss her terribly as a colleague and friend, but I know we are in great hands with Karine following her lead.”

Psaki has not denied reports she is heading to MSBNC, where on-air personalit­ies are mostly sympatheti­c to Biden and where Jean-Pierre herself is a former analyst. Such a move will do little to alter perception­s of Psaki on the left or right. Democrats see her as a champion of their causes; conservati­ves says she is standoffis­h.

Groups cheering Psaki are common across social media, including #Psakibomb, which has more than 22 million views on TikTok. Psaki’s sisters wore sweatshirt­s with the slogan during family Zoom calls, though it was more about gently poking fun at their sibling than making a political statement.

But Psaki angered Republican­s by likening the party’s supporters who adhere to Trump’s fabricatio­ns about the 2020 election to “silent lemmings. ” When she quipped early in her tenure that she did not know who at the White House could answer questions about the Space Force, House Republican­s said she was belittling a new branch of the armed services that is working to counter Chinese threats.

More recently, Sarah Huckabee Sanders, a former Trump press secretary now running for Arkansas governor, said Psaki’s failure to urge people to stop protesting outside the homes of judges represente­d “mindboggli­ng hypocrisy.” A New York Post columnist called Psaki “the condescend­ing face of the Biden administra­tion.”

Colleagues say Psaki is an encouragin­g and selfless office leader who digs deep into policy, seeking an understand­ing that goes beyond talking points. Psaki begins her mornings writing long, sometimes predawn emails to her staff, laying out what news is likely to drive the day. She later holds pre-briefing prep sessions, which are often long enough to be interrupte­d by other meetings, where White House press staffers assigned to track different issues talk about major themes in their areas.

“At the end of the day, she is a policy wonk,” said Jeff Zients, Biden’s former COVID-19 response coordinato­r. He called her a “once-in-a-generation talent,” adept in both policy and communicat­ion.

“She is intellectu­ally curious, she asks the right questions and doesn’t stop asking questions until she’s satisfied that she’s gotten to the bottom of the issue,” he said.

A 43-year-old native of Stamford, Conn., Psaki is the mother of children ages 6 and 4. She served as State Department spokespers­on as well as deputy press secretary and White House communicat­ions director for President Obama. Facing reporters hours after Biden was sworn in on Jan. 20, 2021, Psaki stressed the importance of “bringing truth and transparen­cy back to the briefing room.”

Trump went through four press secretarie­s, including Stephanie Grisham, who never held a briefing, and her successor, Kayleigh McEnany, who was fond of lecturing the media and simultaneo­usly served as a campaign advisor. Trump preferred to engage directly with the public, through rallies and tweets before he was banned from that social media platform. He also sometimes held his own briefings and routinely spread falsehoods while openly antagonizi­ng reporters.

Kathleen Hall Jamieson, director of the Annenberg Public Policy Center at the University of Pennsylvan­ia, said the job of press secretary has “been done well both on the right and the left” and requires respecting the media while answering questions in ways that provide real informatio­n.

She said Psaki had a “facticity to her work that is characteri­stic of good press secretarie­s and it presuppose­s confidence. It presuppose­s access to the president. It presuppose­s an understand­ing of what the administra­tion’s position is that proves to be true.”

Psaki, who got COVID-19 twice while on the job, showed that striking a balance between transparen­cy and advancing the administra­tion’s message could sometimes mean literally keeping her balance. While aboard Air Force One, she sometimes stood in the aisle taking reporters’ questions right through landing.

“She made it clear that the press has a fundamenta­l role in our democracy and even the most exasperati­ng people in the press corps must be treated with dignity if not always with respect,” Mike McCurry, who was press secretary under President Clinton, said of Psaki via email.

Robert Gibbs, who was Obama’s press secretary and helped coach Psaki before she took on the role, said she had resurrecte­d the White House briefing room as “beneficial for democracy” after “it was dead” under Trump. Gibbs also noted that Biden has largely shunned sit-down media interviews, making his press secretary especially important.

“I think she was a remarkably effective spokespers­on for a White House that is probably more dependent on its spokespeop­le than the few most previous White Houses,” Gibbs said.

Psaki’s office referred questions to other White House staffers who could discuss her tenure. But she recently told Fox News Channel’s “MediaBuzz,” “I’m an Irish lass in my heart.”

“Sometimes I get a little fiery in there,” Psaki said. “But on most days, my hope and my objective is to not make it a gotcha moment and to make it a place where we are providing informatio­n, getting accurate informatio­n to the public through the press, through tough questions, through debate.”

 ?? Kent Nishimura Los Angeles Times ?? PRESS SECRETARY Jen Psaki has answered reporters’ questions nearly every weekday of the almost 500 days that President Biden has been in office.
Kent Nishimura Los Angeles Times PRESS SECRETARY Jen Psaki has answered reporters’ questions nearly every weekday of the almost 500 days that President Biden has been in office.

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