D.C. Mayor Vince Gray’s weekly news conference got off to a grumbling start Wednesday morning when a spokesman announced from the podium that the mayor would not take any “off topic” questions.
Everyone in the room already knew Gray would be announcing that Kaya Henderson is his pick to drop the “interim” part of her title as chancellor of the D.C. schools. But the real focus for many reporters of late has been the stream of scandals that have plagued the Gray administration.
Reporters were patient though, wading through an hour-and-a-half of dry topics before the Washington City Paper’s Alan Suderman asked Gray about Sulaimon Brown, who claimed that he took cash from the Gray for Mayor campaign to stay in the race last summer and continue to attack then-Mayor Adrian Fenty. But Suderman ran into a brick wall: Gray refused to answer questions about Sulaimon Brown, or anything else at that point.
“I have no plans of talking about this,” Gray said in a stern voice.
Other reporters pressed, but he wouldn’t budge. Gray also usually sticks around after news conferences to answer a few extra questions, but on Wednesday he quickly retreated to the elevator leading up to his top-floor, guarded office in the John A. Wilson Building.
