Jennifer Palmieri has been surprised by President Donald Trump’s communications operation.
Hillary Clinton’s former communications director said Wednesday she thought the Trump White House would take a much more unconventional approach to getting the president’s message out to voters. For the most part, Palmieri said, the Trump administration has followed much of the normal script, especially in regards to holding daily press briefings.
However, she added, there’s more this White House should be doing to explain what’s going on to voters.
“I have been surprised that [the way they communicate] is relatively conventional, actually,” Palmieri said during an interview at the Newseum in the nation’s capital. “I thought that it is, I think is very helpful for the press, it’s good for America, it has certainly been helpful on my side of aisle, for Democrats, that there is daily [White House] briefing. I wasn’t sure that they would continue that.”
However, she added in reference to the daily briefings, they don’t “seem to be a very effective way for Trump to actually, and the Trump White House, to actually communicate with the American people.”
“There is a lot that comes out of that briefing that’s newsy, and that’s great for the public, and there certainly have been moments that were helpful for us. But they do that, Trump goes on Fox and Trump tweets, but other than that, they don’t do much communicating,” she said. “I thought that they would be more unconventional in trying to reach local press, trying to reach regional press, doing, you know, President Trump could be going on some of the softer television shows.”
