Josh Earnest: ‘I’m sympathetic to’ Spicer

Former President Obama’s White House press secretary Josh Earnest ripped President Trump and his communications team on Friday, saying that the president must “empower” White House press secretary Sean Spicer. 

“I will say that I’m sympathetic to Sean’s plight when he says there are days when he can’t into the Oval Office before the he does the briefing,” Earnest told MSNBC. “That is a basic, fundamental responsibility of somebody for speaking for the president of the United States.” 

{mosads}“And that’s not Sean’s fault, that’s the fault of the president of the United States, who needs to empower his press secretary and his spokespeople to understand what he’s thinking and be able to accurately relate it to the world.”

Earnest added that the Trump administration’s communications issues “are a problem and a flaw that starts at the top.”

Spicer said earlier Friday that he occasionally struggles to huddle with Trump during the president’s “very robust schedule.”

“I think sometimes we don’t have an opportunity to get in to see him to get his full thinking,” Spicer said at his daily press briefing. “In those cases, we do our best to follow up with you.”

Deputy press secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders on Thursday said she had not met with Trump before delivering a press briefing the day before.

“I think it’s pretty simple, I hadn’t had a chance to have the conversation directly with the president,” she said.  “I went off the information I had.”