‘Don’t count Trump out’ in 2020, Maggie Haberman tells Pittsburgh crowd
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New York Times White House correspondent Maggie Haberman – who has been called the “Trump Whisperer” by media outlets and a “third-rate reporter” by President Donald Trump – spoke at Chatham University on Wednesday about what it’s like covering his administration.
Haberman addressed everything from Twitter to the 2020 presidential campaign.
“I would not count him out,” Haberman said of Trump in 2020. “How things look now is not how things will look in 19 months.”
More than 600 people turned out for Haberman’s public lecture, “The President and the Press: What a Long, Complicated Relationship It’s Been.”
Her roughly 45-minute talk was punctuated with laughs and was followed by audience questions.
Here is a short list of some of the more interesting things she shared:
On Twitter and Trump:
Haberman said one of her colleagues bought an Apple Watch so he could get Trump’s tweets in the shower.
“I think people are still figuring it out,” Haberman said.
(Read Haberman’s essay “Why I Needed to Pull Back From Twitter”)
On the scoop she said “no” to:
Someone pitched her the exclusive on Trump’s presidential announcement, but Haberman turned it down because of his previous false election starts.
“In hindsight, it was not the best call,” Haberman said.
On the Washington Post’s 9,451 tally of Trump’s false and misleading statements:
“Is that a lot?” Haberman said to laughter.
On Trump’s relationship with the media:
“It’s complicated,” Haberman said. “He craves, thrives off and needs the press in a way few elected officials do.”
On Trump’s “fake news” rhetoric:
“It seeks to erode faith in institutions, and it’s dangerous over the long haul,” Haberman said.