SURE JAN: White House Denies “War On The Press”

The Hill reports:

White House press secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders on Tuesday night argued the Trump administration has “not declared war on the press,” despite concerns from a past press secretary.

Mike McCurry, who served as press secretary during the Clinton administration, pressed Sanders over President Trump’s repeated attacks on the media, including his claim that the media is the “enemy of the American people.”

Speaking at a White House Correspondents’ Association panel discussion, McCurry said Sanders can’t execute her role if the administration says it’s “at war with these people every day in the media.”

More from the Washington Post:

Speaking of his time at the lectern, McCurry said the Clinton administration recognized that the media could be hard-edged, “but we did not declare war on them.” Sanders, perhaps ignoring her boss’s Twitter account: “We have not declared war on the press.”

McCurry: “Yes, you did. Yes, you did and that’s a big, big difference and you need to roll that back. The president has got to roll that back.”

To the general knock that the president is inimical to the media, Sanders responded with his accessibility. At so-called pool sprays and other occasions, the president has made himself available to reporters for short Q-and-A sessions, though he hasn’t held a full-force presidential news conference in just more than a year.