![]() Those who had front row seats included correspondents like CBS’s Chip Reid and Fox News’ Major Garrett. And as television viewership grew, the trend became even more pronounced, with figures like CNN’s John King and David Gregory seeing their careers launched after tenures on the White House beat.īy the early years of the Barack Obama presidency, reporters were piling into the cramped briefing room, literally lining the aisles in hopes of lobbing questions at press secretary Robert Gibbs. Reporters like Sarah McClendon and Helen Thomas, Sam Donaldson and Thomas DeFrank, became icons in the industry. The result was the forming of the White House Correspondents’ Association, an institution explicitly devised to protect and promote the interests of those reporting on the president. Wilson would simply cancel the press conference altogether. Grew alarmed, either that the Congressional Standing Committee of Correspondents would get to choose who covered Woodrow Wilson’s press conferences or that Teddy Roosevelt was the first president to actually give reporters a place to work in the White HouseĪfter taking pity on a group huddled in the rain outside the gates.Īn actual association of those reporters came into place in 1914, when those covering the White House But the concept of the White House correspondent began hardening in the late 1800s and early 1900s when presidents started holding regular meetings with reporters. The White House has always been covered by the press. Who’s the Maggie of the Biden administration? It doesn’t exist.” It’s tough to be a White House correspondent if you want to break news, they’re so airtight,” another reporter who covered both the Trump and Biden White Houses from the briefing room. It is serious business… It’s probably good for democracy for this to be less personality based and more about the work.”īut for the White House scribes, the ones shaking out their tuxedos and cocktail dresses to gather for the White House Correspondents’ dinner on Saturday, it’s been an adjustment at best and deflating at worst. “The histrionics probably got out of control. “It’s not such a bad thing that there’s a new sense of sobriety in the White House briefing room,” said Eric Schultz, a former deputy press secretary under Obama. Which tracks book sales in the U.S., said that prominent books about Trump released in his first two years of office outsold Biden books during his first year and a half by, what an official there said was, “essentially 10:1.” A newly released biography about Jill Biden, by two well-respected Associated Press journalists, sold just 250 units in its first week, according to the company.įor the vast majority of Americans, and even plenty of people in Washington, it’s all been a relief - the minute-by-minute churn of presidential politics is no longer so omnipresent and existential in their lives. Bye-bye to the massive TV budgets for White House specials and the firehose of publishing deals for books about the administration. So long to the five alarm Friday news dumps that had editors frantically rearranging weekend plans. Gone are the Tweets that sent newsrooms scrambling. Jawing with Jen just makes you look like an asshole.” ![]() “And the work is a lot less rewarding, because you’re no longer saving democracy from Sean Spicer and his Men’s Wearhouse suit. “Jen is very good at her job, which is unfortunate,” one reporter who has covered the past two administrations from the room said. Running for office against Donald Trump - the most theatrical, attention-seeking, Beltway-panic-inducing president in living memory - he pledged to make Washington news boring again. Rather, what is happening is the fulfillment of a central Biden promise. ![]() Nor has it meant that the work being done hasn’t been important: major stories are being broken regularly on everything from the Covid fight, to the war in Ukraine, to inflation, immigration and legislative battles over the social safety net. The dulling down of the White House beat is not due to a lack of reportorial talent in the room. “I can’t think of any ,” said a well-known television news executive. The Obama press room launched a whole cohort of journalists into media stardom. POLITICO Weekend delivers gripping reads, smart analysis and a bit of high-minded fun. ![]()
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