Taylor’s Takes: It’s nice to hear ACTUAL answers again

POP QUIZ!

Who said the following: “When the president asked me to serve in this role, we talked about the importance of bringing truth and transparency back to the briefing room…”

Was it A) Karoline Leavitt or B) Jen Psaki?

If you chose Karoline Leavitt, you would be mistaken.

That quote was from Psaki’s first briefing as Joe Biden’s press secretary in 2021. It was laughable then. It’s pitiful now.

Through Psaki’s tenure as press secretary, we heard nothing but streams of lies spewing from behind the lectern in the Brady Briefing Room. Lies about Biden’s health, his cognitive decline, his involvement in policy-making, and so on.

I daresay the lying became even more bold and brazen following Jen’s departure when Karine Jean-Pierre was ushered into the role.

It was clear KJP was in over her head, and was only using her position to boost her own ego. It was never about serving the White House press corps with truth and transparency. From her first day, she prided herself on being the first minority immigrant queer woman to serve as press secretary to the President.

Big deal.

Nevertheless, the lies and question-dodging became even more prevalent as time went on.

That’s all over now. A golden age of transparency is upon us. The people surrounding President Trump are upfront and telling us what they can. And it’s extremely refreshing.

Tuesday afternoon I was standing in the studio green room during a break in the show, watching Karoline Leavitt answer the stream of questions flowing from the press corps.

This has become a normal sight, of course. During Trump’s first term there were press briefings nearly every single day. Oftentimes, it was the President himself who led the briefings, taking questions for hours on end.

It seems President Trump has taken more of a “hands off” approach during his second term, however, allowing his press team and surrogates to handle the public messaging. It’s the smart move.

One answer from Leavitt in particular struck me as incredibly plain-spoken and matter-of-fact.

CNN’s Alayna Treene was called upon by Karoline to ask a question. Treene proceeded to inquire about the public feud over President Trump’s tariff policy between Elon Musk and one of Trump’s advisors, Peter Navarro.

“Musk actually referred to Navarro as being ‘dumber than a sack of bricks,” explained Treene.
“Are you at all — or is the administration, the President at all concerned that this is maybe impacting the public’s understanding of these tariffs and might be messing with the message on it?”

To be sure, the question was expected by Leavitt. Musk had begun over the weekend criticizing the tariffs and Navarro in particular. Navarro responded in kind during several network interviews on Monday, dismissing Musk as merely a “car assembler” and not a “car manufacturer.”

The feud further escalated with Musk taking to X and coining a nickname for the President’s counselor: Peter Retarrdo.

Juvenile? Absolutely. No question about it. The disagreement did not need to happen so publicly and did not need to descend to petty name-calling from the world’s wealthiest man.

But it did happen publicly. And it did descend to petty name-calling. And now it needed to be addressed by the White House press secretary.

“No,” Leavitt said, smiling as she responded to the CNN reporter’s question. “Look, these are obviously two individuals who have very different views on trade and on tariffs.”

I expected nothing less, of course, but I was impressed that we once again had a press secretary who was able to acknowledge and verify something as small as a public spat between two men who are very close to President Trump’s ear. The bar had been set quite low by Karoline’s two predecessors.

But that admission wasn’t what floored me. It was her next line.

“Boys will be boys,” said Leavitt through laughter, “and we will let their public sparring continue.”

“WOW,” I exclaimed to the guys in the green room. “That was a terrific answer.” It’s not that the answer was overtly intellectual in nature. It was just an honest response to something that had obviously played out in public for all to see. And Karoline Leavitt had not only acknowledged the disagreement, she put all controversy about it to bed.

The American people had been gaslit so much over the past four years by the words that poured from Psaki and KJP’s lips. It seemed we’d never hear a simple truth from a White House spokesperson ever again. We were so used to Psaki “circling back” and KJP haughtily dismissing questions she deemed outrageous or insulting.

But we have escaped that toxic relationship. With answers like Karoline Leavitt provided to Alayna Treene, we can once again feel what its like to be treated with respect. Because that’s what we deserve.

“And you guys should all be very grateful that we have the most transparent administration in history,” wrapped Karoline.

We are grateful.

And thank you, Karoline, for treating the press corps and, by extension, the voters like the adults we are.

It turns out we CAN handle the truth.