Ms. Psaki said she hoped to invite Republicans onto her program, and NBC representatives, seeking to emphasize her independence, pointed to her occasional on-air quibbles with the Biden administration. In September, she said on “Meet the Press” that Democrats “will lose” the 2022 elections if voters perceived the midterms as “a referendum on the president.”
In the interview, Ms. Psaki was asked to offer a sample critique of Mr. Biden. “I certainly was critical of the way things were handled around the sharing of information about the documents,” she said, referring to the White House’s decision to keep the public in the dark for weeks about classified documents found at Mr. Biden’s residence.
But Press Secretary Psaki quickly returned. “At the same time, there can be a tendency to make it into a five-alarm fire — like, everything is a disaster! My tendency is to provide context when needed.”
MSNBC viewers may not care either way. In this tribal moment in media and politics, Americans tend to flock to news sources that reaffirm their beliefs. When George Stephanopoulos moved from Bill Clinton’s White House to ABC News in 1996, it set off alarm bells among media ethicists. That was a less partisan era.
“As an analyst, the thing I told myself was, ‘How do you maintain your integrity and do your job?’” Mr. Stephanopoulos said in an interview, reflecting on his transition into TV. “For me it was, it was appropriate to say on the air what I would say in a meeting. Sometimes that could be critical: If the president took an action that I would have argued against in the meeting, I’d have no problem making that point.”
Mr. Psaki reached out to Mr. Stephanopoulos for advice shortly after leaving the White House. “The balancing act is, how are you consistent with your past work and your past beliefs, and still constructive for the audience,” Mr. Stephanopoulos recalled telling her. “That’s applicable then, today, and tomorrow.”
Ms. Psaki, who took a few months off over the summer traveling with family, said the debut of “Inside” meant that her political career was officially over. “I am not joining a re-elect ever again,” she said. “Nor do I have any plans to go back to government. Ever.”
How about running for office?
“God forbid,” Ms. Psaki said. “That’s my worst nightmare.”
Source: | This article originally belongs to Nytimes.com
