White House: No classified information at Trump-Abe dinner

by Jordan Fabian - 02/13/17 6:44 PM ET

No classified information was present when President Trump and Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe publicly discussed a North Korean missile test at the president’s Florida club, his top spokesman said Monday.

Patrons at the Mar-a-Lago club posted photos on social media of Trump, Abe and their aides scrambling in response to the launch, prompting concerns about a possible security breach.

{mosads}But White House press secretary Sean Spicer told reporters Trump “was briefed in a [Secure Compartmentalized Information Facility] — a classified room — prior to dinner on the situation in North Korea.”

“Then the president was subsequently briefed again in a classified setting after the dinner before they went out and spoke,” Spicer said. “That’s it.”

In photos of the two leaders speaking at their dinner table surrounded by paperwork and staff, Spicer said Trump and Abe were “reviewing logistics for the press conference” when they first addressed Pyongyang’s test.

Trump and Abe decided to hold the brief news conference at the club instead of a nearby hotel, according to the spokesman.

Spicer said it’s possible the contents of their remarks were discussed at the dinner table but that was not the bulk of the conversation.

Tags