Kayleigh McEnany Watch: So organized!

Context for that question comes from a whole bunch of states that are struggling anew with coronavirus outbreaks. Florida, South Carolina and Texas, for example, set one-day death records on Thursday. “We are seeing state after state not just facing escalating cases, but facing devastation,” said Kentucky Gov. Andy Beshear. “When you put up record numbers of cases, while our hospitals are working really hard, we will see more death.”

But McEnany’s response to the question didn’t provide much of an answer. “The president is routinely focused on the coronavirus,” she said. “I think you’ll be hearing more about what we’re doing in the coming week. He’s hard at work. We talk about covid every day from this podium. The task force is hard at work.”

That portion of her response appeared to come off the cuff. The subsequent portion appeared to come from her prepared material. “And I’m glad you ask about covid, in particular, because I just want to read through some of the things that we are doing, which I think is — most important than what we’re saying is what we’re doing,” said McEnany, as she flipped to the appropriate page. She ticked off a number of measures.

This she did with fluidity. And now we know why: Even President Trump could perform PR wonders with this easy-to-use briefing binder. Here’s a look at its guts, thanks to a photo from Jonathan Ernst of Reuters:

There are tabs for GOYA, WINS, CHINA, FAUCI, HEALTH, MEDIA, MASKS, MARY (presumably Trump’s niece, the recently published author Mary L. Trump), REOPEN and so on. There’s even one for LIES, the go-to tab for anyone who signs up to flack for Trump.

Ernst appears to have photographed the briefing binder from McEnany’s left, just alongside the lectern. Thanks to social-distancing imperatives, that particular area is less cluttered with personnel and equipment than it was pre-coronavirus, as this blog explained in a previous post. A Post photographer in March used a nearby space to capture an edit in President Trump’s materials that replaced a reference to “Corona" virus with “Chinese." “That area was not an area that still photographers occupied prior to the coronavirus briefings,” New York Times photographer Doug Mills told the Erik Wemple Blog in April.

Thanks to the photo, we know what McEnany has brought to the task of covering for a lazy, mendacious, racist, sexist, misanthropic president: first-rate organizational skills.

Don’t underestimate their importance. At any given briefing, McEnany turns frequently to her impeccably tabulated topic binder. It’s not difficult, after all, to anticipate what issues will be of interest to White House reporters. Every day McEnany and her colleagues in the White House communications shop receive emails from correspondents asking about this matter or that matter. The assembled files enable McEnany to pepper her responses with specifics — quotes, statistics, anecdotes, whatever advances her cause.

The best antidote to a free-associating liar of a president is a properly bindered machine of a press secretary.

Does Vox want to take back that they proclaim that the coronavirus would not be a deadly pandemic? Does The Washington Post want to take back that they told Americans to get a grip, the flu is bigger than the coronavirus? Does The Washington Post, likewise, want to take back that our brains are causing us to exaggerate the threat of the coronavirus? Does the New York Times want to take back that fear of the virus may be spreading faster than the virus itself? Does NPR want to take back that the flu was a much bigger threat than the coronavirus? And finally, once again The Washington Post: Would they like to take back that the government should not respond aggressively to the coronavirus? I’ll leave you with those questions, and maybe you’ll have some answers in a few days.

For perspective on press-secretary binders, we turned to George Condon, a White House reporter for National Journal who has attended briefings with 17 press secretaries since Larry Speakes in 1982. “I don’t remember any one of them winging it. It’s fair to say that the preparation has gotten more organized and the binder more sophisticated and thicker. Josh Earnest brought one out there that would rival Kayleigh’s,” notes Condon, referring to President Barack Obama’s final press secretary.

“[M]ost press secretaries routinely come to the podium armed with talking points, opening statements and comebacks for likely questions given the topics of the moment,” emails Tom DeFrank, a contributing editor to National Journal who has covered 10 presidents. “But Kayleigh arrives with the War and Peace of briefing materials. In more than 52 years of covering WH briefings … I’ve never seen a binder that prodigious at a regular briefing.”

Sticking to scripts has enabled McEnany to avoid the fate of Sean Spicer, a fellow who could have used McEnany’s binder now and again (and again). Watching McEnany in front of a depleted group of reporters, it’s evident that responses are workshopped — vetted and rehearsed. It is possible, accordingly, that McEnany represents the very best day-to-day defense that Trumpism can procure.

And that is by no means an endorsement.

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