“Senior administration officials” head to an undisclosed location (ap photo)
The White House press corps is challenging the Obama administration’s reliance on background briefings by unnamed officials –noting that the same officials tend to turn up soon after, delivering the same message on television. And more to the point, didn’t President Obama run on a promise of transparent government?
Jennifer Loven, White House bureau chief for the AP and president of the White House Correspondents Association, told Howard Kurtz that yesterday’s briefing on Sonia Sotomayor was a perfect example of the abuse of backgrounders, noting the subject matter fell short of state secrets.
The White House responded as they generally do — by personalizing the issue and noting that AP had no problem reporting Sotomayor’s nomination based on anonymous sources. Touche, Robert Gibbs, but what about reporters (like the Examiner’s White House correspondent) who don’t rely on unnamed sources and don’t relish having to quote administration officials off TV?
It’s an insider issue, to be sure — but with so many losing faith in journalism, reporters must be more scrupulous about safeguarding whatever shreds of public trust remain. Anonymous sourcing doesn’t help. Obama’s popularity insulates the administration from public accountability on press openness — and reporters who don’t want to abide by their rules don’t have to attend their briefings.
But is this what Obama promised? The administration’s very first briefing after inauguration day was a backgrounder on Gitmo, and they have been off and running (anonymously) ever since.
Presidential administrations throughout history have used the background briefing, and in some cases they are justified. But increasingly, the modern White House press office is using the backgrounder simply as a public relations device — to shape the message, without getting out in front of the president.
Both Kurtz and James Rainey of the LA Times outed yesterday’s briefers as Obama senior adviser David Axelrod and Ron Klain, chief of staff for Vice President Joe Biden. When Rainey called the press office to talk about the policy, they again personalized it — telling him the LA Times uses information on background, too. So, that’s the standard?
Shortly after Gibbs demanded yesterday’s briefing be attributed to “senior administration officials,” Axelrod was making the rounds of TV cameras, talking about Sotomayor on the record.
“Why would a White House that promised more transparency insist on anonymity for the two officials who spoke to the press?” Rainey wondered. “I do think Team Obama has continued a distasteful and potentially damaging practice.”
