“Mr. President, two questions, if you’ll indulge me, please.”
And with that, Sean Spicer got a fresh view of the White House briefing room, popping up in the backroom to lob a question at the podium where he once presided as press secretary.
He was afforded no special favors, waiting for at least eight other reporters to ask questions during the regular White House briefing on the coronavirus.
Spicer recently launched a show on Newsmax and took up the TV channel’s assigned seat on Friday, where he was called upon by his former employer.
“Yeah, please,” said President Trump. “No, at the back, please.”
Anyone worried that he was taking up space that could have gone to a more critical reporter may have been pleased by the tenor of his questions, asking first about help for small businesses but then getting to the tougher matter of whether senators profited from inside information about the risk of the coronavirus.
“Are you concerned about members of Congress that may have used information they learned on updates to sell stocks and profit off of this?” he asked.
Trump replied, “I’m not aware of it. I saw some names. I know all of them. I know everyone mentioned, Dianne Feinstein, I guess, and a couple of others. I don’t know too much about what it’s about.
“But I find them all to be very honorable people.”
Spicer served as Trump’s first press secretary but resigned in July 2017 when Trump appointed Anthony Scaramucci to be White House communications director.
