The hosts of “CBS This Morning” peppered Sen. Tim Kaine, D-Va., with questions Thursday morning about Hillary Clinton’s lack of press availability, prompting the Democratic nominee’s running mate to hint her campaign will be more open with reporters in the near future.
The moment occurred as the the hosts discussed a joint press conference this week in Mexico City between GOP nominee Donald Trump and President Enrique Pena Nieto.
“[Trump] immediately opened up the floor to reporters for questions. When will we see Hillary open up the floor and take questions from reporters at any event?” one host asked Kaine.
The Democratic nominee hasn’t held a single press conference in 2016. In contrast, Trump has already held 17 unscripted, back-and-forth conversations with members of the press.
Clinton has agreed to dozens of sit-down interviews this year, but most of these exchanges are orchestrated affairs involving pre-selected media personalities asking pre-approved questions.
None of these appearances have featured the sort of unscripted, back-and-forth quality that defines traditional press conferences.
Kaine, for his part, dismissed the question from the “CBS This Morning” team and maintained that Clinton has taken questions from members of the press.
“You see Hillary take questions from reporters every day. She does — she talks to the press everywhere she goes,” Kaine said.
An incredulous Norah O’Donnell, who maintained Thursday it had been more than 200 days since Clinton last held a formal press conference, asked, “Really?”
Kaine alleged Clinton participated in a press conference as recently as last month when she spoke at the National Association of Black Journalists and the National Association of Hispanic Journalists convention in Washington, D.C.
“When she was at a recent — she did a press conference when she was at the recent meeting of the African-American and Hispanic newspaper publishers,” Kaine said. “I think she did a news conference with the publishers of the nation’s African-American and Hispanic newspapers within the last month and that counts. They are a legitimate group, and a press conference with them counts.”
Clinton’s appearance last month at the journalism convention included nearly a dozen instances of attendees clapping and cheering the Democratic presidential candidate. Clinton did take some questions from reporters after her address, but only from pre-selected members of the press.
Though many reporters said at the time Clinton’s appearance at the journalism convention most certainly did not count as participating in a press conference, the Democratic nominee’s campaign continues to say otherwise.
And even if it did count as a press conference, the fact remains Clinton doesn’t do “it that often,” the “CBS This Morning” hosts continued Thursday.
“Well, look. I don’t see what the massive difference is between a press conference and talking to the press everywhere you go. She talks to the press a lot. And I’ve been with her when she has talked to the press,” Kaine said in the candidate’s defense.
Last week, when a handful of reporters asked Clinton to elaborate on her claim Trump has legitimized racist hate groups, the former secretary of state ignored their questions entirely and instead tried to distract them with chocolate.
O’Donnell kept after the point Thursday, and noted that, “unlike any other presidential nominee in history, [Clinton] is not allowing journalists to accompany her on the campaign plane.”
“This is something that has been standard since I’ve covered presidential campaigns. Why is that the case? Do you believe in transparency? Do you believe this will change?” she asked the senator.
In response to her line of inquiries, Kaine hinted the Clinton campaign would make a greater effort in the coming weeks to be more open to the press.
“I’m traveling, too, and I travel in a small plane, and the press travels in a plane with me. We are not on the plane together,” he explained. “But that is going to change in about a week. And I think that is fairly common during campaigns that you often fly in small planes, and that you get to the end, you start flying in larger planes. I think that is something, yeah, as we get into the thick of the campaign in Labor Day, that that is going to change.”
He concluded by taking a shot at Trump, and noting the fact that American press were barred from a private conversation between the GOP nominee and Pena Nieto.
“I don’t even think Donald trump allowed the American press to go with him yesterday when he went to Mexico, which was highly unusual,” Kaine said.
The “CBS This Morning” hosts ended with, “Well, we do look forward to that next press conference.”
