The Washington Post - 29.08.2019

C2 EZ RE THE WASHINGTON POST.THURSDAY, AUGUST 29 , 2019

Wing, she’s held 79 internal

meetings, had 43 “scheduled”

meetings with reporters (and 35

of the unscheduled kind), and

been on four domestic trips with

the president.

When she worked in the East

Wing, just one person reported to

her. Now 40 people do.

“I think I serve four audiences

— the president, the first lady, the

press and my team,” she said in

an interview in her West Wing

office, a high-ceilinged expanse

the size of a studio apartment.

“I’m trying to serve the first two,

first and foremost, and then I’m

trying to get to know the other

two.... With both of those, I’ve

been asking them what can be

done differently, what are some

challenges. And that takes time.”

But Grisham knows her place,

too, which is in the background

of the man she refers to as “the

boss.” “ This president is really his

own spokesperson,” she says, re-

flecting a common perception.

“That’s the reality of this White

House. And I’m trying to work

within the reality of this White

House.”

I

n her few media appearances

and public statements, Gr-

isham has proved to be as

combative, and even occasionally

as caustic, as Sanders could be in

her dealings with the news me-

dia. She just hasn’t done it from a

lectern.

There was the time in April, for

example, when she smacked

down Vogue editor Anna Win-

tour after Wintour seemed to

suggest — it wasn’t really clear —

that she had no plans to put

Melania Trump on the maga-

zine’s c over. “Her role as first lady

of the United States and all that

she does is much m ore important

than some superficial photo

shoot and cover,” Grisham said at

the time. “This just further dem-

onstrates how biased the fashion

magazine industry is, and shows

how insecure and small-minded

Anna Wintour really is.”

Or that time in 2017 when she

unloaded on Trump’s first wife,

Ivana, for saying during a book

tour that she spoke with her

ex-husband on occasion because

“I’m first lady.” Grisham replied

that Melania Trump “plans to use

her title and role to help children,

not sell books.”

Or that time last month when

Grisham defended the president

amid outrage over his tweets

advising four freshmen Demo-

cratic congresswomen to “go

back” to where they came from.

Grisham blamed “the main-

stream media and Dems” for

their response, saying they had

attacked Trump “for speaking

directly to the American people.”

The blame-the-messenger

tone suggests there isn’t much

daylight between Grisham and

her predecessors, Sanders and

Sean Spicer, or between her and

the boss, who regularly showers

the news media with contempt.

Asked for her general view of

the press, Grisham offers a

Trump-like critique. “I think in

many aspects the press does

amazing things and helps a lot of

people,” s he says. But then comes

a pivot:

“Do I believe that their cover-

age is slanted and biased? Yes.

I’ve seen it with my own eyes. A

majority of reporters are liberal.

A lot of reporters are uncomfort-

able with him and his blunt way

of speaking. I think this is the

first time they’ve been so publicly

called out for some of their be-

haviors and their instinct is to

fight back rather than take a step

back” and assess their conduct.

His blunt way of speaking?

Does Grisham think Trump ever

lies? After all, as of Aug. 5, The

Washington Post Fact Checker

had documented 12,019 false or

misleading claims made by

Trump during his presidency.

“No,” she responds without

hesitation. “I don’t think they’re

lies.... I think the president

communicates in a way that

some people, especially the me-

dia, aren’t necessarily comfort-

able with. A lot of times they take

him so literally. I know people

will roll their eyes if I say he was

just kidding or was speaking in

hypotheticals, but sometimes he

is. What I’ve learned about him is

that he loves this country and

he’s not going to lie to this

country.”

Grisham’s limited public expo-

sure seems to have spared her

blowback for her few public ac-

tions as press secretary. In early

August, for example, she banned

a reporter, Brian Karem of Play-

boy magazine, from entering the

GRISHAM FROM C1

White House for 30 days to pun-

ish him for his conduct at a Rose

Garden event in July (Karem has

disputed the White House’s char-

acterization of the incident and

has sued Grisham and Trump to

regain his press credential).

When Sanders did the same

thing in November to CNN’s Jim

Acosta, the decision sparked out-

rage and wide media attention.

The reaction to Karem has so far

been more muted, perhaps be-

cause he is a less recognizable

figure than Acosta and possibly

because banning reporters is no

longer so unusual. But it might

also be because Grisham has said

so little about it.

Still, Trump’s p enchant for ver-

bal brawls has left her with little

choice but to dive in on the boss’s

behalf. She played an important,

if unseen, role in the sprawling

public-relations mess that Trump

left in the wake of his recent visit

to Dayton, Ohio, and El Paso to

meet with first responders and

survivors of the mass shootings.

After Trump took offense at

allegedly critical comments by

Sen. Sherrod Brown (D-Ohio)

and Democratic Mayor Nan Wha-

ley following his visit to a Dayton

hospital, Grisham accused them

of holding “a dishonest press

conference in the name of parti-

san politics.” It wasn’t entirely

clear, however, what had enraged

the president; Brown and Wha-

ley had actually praised his m eet-

ings with hospital staff.

Grisham also got an earful

from Trump, who excoriated

aides on Air Force One for failing

to allow TV news cameras to

record his visits to the hospitals.

(The White House said it had

excluded reporters because of

logistics and privacy concerns.)

The video images that did emerge

were damning: Soon after he left

El Paso, cellphone footage sur-

faced showing Trump bragging

in the hospital about the size of

his rally crowds and trashing

Democratic candidate Beto

O’Rourke of El Paso.

And then the White House

itself tweeted a photo of the

Trumps posing with a baby who

had been orphaned in the El Paso

shootings, with the president

grinning broadly and giving a

thumbs-up sign. A shocked and

angry reaction followed from the

president’s critics.

Grisham says she doesn’t re-

gret her shop’s handling of the

situation. “Air Force One hadn’t

even taken off yet and [Brown

and Whaley] were already in

front of the TV cameras charac-

terizing the trip in a way that was

not meant to do anything but

further divide a community that

was already hurting,” s he says.

As for the photo: “The presi-

dent poses like that with people

all the time and the family cer-

tainly didn’t take it the wrong

way,” she said. “They knew their

president was there to listen to

them and provide comfort, and

that is what matters.”

G

risham is guarded about her

upbringing and pre-White

House life, but allows that

she was born in Colorado and is

the middle child of three ( “I come

from a family of farmers,” she

says, without offering further de-

tail). Twice divorced (one of her

ex-husbands, Dan Marries, is a

longtime TV anchor in Arizona),

she is the mother of two boys,

aged 21 and 11, both of whom live

in Arizona.

Much of Grisham’s profession-

al career was spent in Arizona in

a succession of public-relations

roles, including briefly owning

her own firm. Not all of it appears

to have gone smoothly: The New

York Times reported last week

that she left two employers amid

questions about her expense ac-

counts and an allegation of pla-

giarism (she called the article

“not honest” and “hateful” but

declined to address it further).

She also had two DUI convic-

tions, which she disclosed before

she began working at the White

House.

In light of that, it’s a bit jarring

to see an array of liquor bottles

on a prominent shelf in her

White House office. Turns out the

bottles are only for display;

they’re part of a collection start-

ed by Sarah Sanders that Gr-

isham kept as an homage to her

predecessor.

Grisham’s professional life in

Arizona included serving as

spokeswoman for the attorney

general, To m Horne (R), and later

the House speaker, David Gowan

(R). While working for Gowan,

she clashed with Hank Stephen-

son, a reporter for the Arizona

Capitol Times, who broke several

stories about Gowan’s misuse of

public resources in 2016. Ste-

phenson later revealed that Gr-

isham herself had remained on

the state payroll for two months

in late 2016, earning $19,000,

without showing up for work,

while she was working on

Trump’s presidential transition

team. In an interview, Stephen-

son said Grisham’s lawyer wrote

a letter threatening to sue the

paper if the story was published.

No lawsuit was ever filed.

Stephenson also said Grisham

repeatedly asked his editor and

publisher to remove him from

the beat, and at one point threat-

ened to yank the newspaper’s

credentials to cover the state

legislature, although the threat

was never carried out.

But Grisham disputes this: “I

know better than to ever attempt

to get a reporter removed from

covering any topic,” she said.

“That would never be an option.”

She also said she spent the final

two months of 2016 assisting

Gowan’s transition from office,

contrary to Stephenson’s claims.

Grisham first came into

Trump’s circle in 2015, when she

began managing the traveling

campaign press, a relatively low-

level position (she was a volun-

teer in Mitt Romney’s 2012 cam-

paign, too). But her stock soared

just a few weeks after Trump was

inaugurated when she was dis-

patched to the East Wing to serve

as Melania Trump’s communica-

tions director. A bond formed;

the private first lady appeared to

regard Grisham as an effective

shield and occasional sword

against the press. When Trump

appointed Grisham as press sec-

retary, the announcement was

made in an unusual way: via a

tweet from Melania Trump.

G

risham says her day usually

starts around 7:30 and often

doesn’t end until 11:30

p.m., reflecting the president’s

own schedule. “He’s up early and

he’s working late,” she said. “In

my m ind, I’ve got to match that to

serve him.”

White House reporters seem to

like Grisham and generally speak

favorably about working with

her. They say she replies to them

quickly behind the scenes, e ven if

she hasn’t addressed the press as

a whole in a briefing.

“I’ve noticed a change in re-

sponsiveness since she took

over,” said Katie Rogers, a White

House reporter for the New York

Times. “Under Sarah, it was any-

one’s guess if the comms shop

would get back to us on even the

most basic questions, but the

group seems more organized un-

der Stephanie.”

Grisham earned some of her

goodwill with the press corps

during Trump’s brief visit to

North Korea in early July. As

Trump was about to meet North

Korean dictator Kim Jong Un in

the demilitarized zone separat-

ing the two Koreas, Grisham

body-blocked North Korean se-

curity officials, enabling Ameri-

can reporters to squeeze by to

record the historic encounter.

The incident left Grisham with a

few bruises.

Grisham isn’t saying no to

restoring the press briefings, but

she isn’t making any commit-

ments, either. That’s Trump’s c all,

she says. She’s also equally vague

on when she’ll do regular TV

interviews.

One reason Grisham m ay w ant

to take her time: The stakes are

mighty high. Trump literally sat

in judgment of her predecessors,

watching their televised brief-

ings in the dining room adjoining

the Oval Office. Sanders won the

president’s loyalty as a result;

Spicer lost favor because of it.

Whenever the day comes, if it

comes, Grisham makes a vow:

She’ll tell the truth.

“I’m always going to do the

very best I can to give the most

accurate answer that I can,” she

says. But she is quick to add,

“What I have learned is that

sometimes those answers

change, and that’s not necessarily

because this administration is

being nefarious. It’s just that

things are fluid and are changing

constantly.”

The public will be watching.

And so will the boss.

[email protected]

Grisham

speaks,

quietly

OLIVER CONTRERAS FOR THE WASHINGTON POST

ABOVE: Stephanie Grisham, who says, “I think I serve four audiences — the president, the first lady, the press and my team.”

BELOW: Kellyanne Conway, principal deputy press secretary Hogan Gidley and Grisham on the South Lawn of the White House.

JABIN BOTSFORD/THE WASHINGTON POST

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