Ari Fleischer, former press secretary to George W. Bush, argued Wednesday that cameras should be taken out of the daily White House briefings.
“The briefing has become a TV show and it’s lost its value as a serious briefing now,” Fleischer said during a panel hosted by the Newseum in Washington.
“The press secretary acts like a participant in a TV show,” Fleischer said. “I used to try to figure out what my bite was, and deliver it with a little hand movement, and look into the middle of the room so my eyes were up. It becomes this stage that you act on.”
Fleischer said the cameras now “do the cutaways of the reporters,” which leads to them playing to the cameras.
“Reporters didn’t used to wear ties or jackets to the briefing,” he said. “Now you notice the TV ones do. And it’s because they know their editors are watching and the bite of their question will make it on the air that night. That’s not a serious policy briefing.”
Said Fleischer: “I would take the briefing off of camera and if there’s an event like September 11th, by mutual agreement, you can change, of course. There are times it should be live. I would work that out with the White House Correspondents’ Association.”
Speaking of press relations with the Trump administration, Fleischer said he doesn’t think the Trump White House needs to “shake things up.”
“It needs to calm things down,” he said. “It needs to just go back to some of the normal things that historically worked in this town, which is actually talking to reporters, filling them what’s going on. Taking questions in as least confrontational atmosphere as possible, which is hard to do, but the camera makes it more confrontational and often unnecessary.”
Fleischer was on a panel with former Hillary Clinton communications director Jennifer Palmieri.
