by Dana Perino
My experience with the President was that he was able to look beyond the briefing papers, to cut through to the point right away. He kept a broader perspective in mind, focused on a goal, and figured out what was needed from everyone to reach it. He never admonished or lectured other leaders, but he was firm and encouraged them to do better by their people. Moments like these didn’t happen in front of reporters, but I’m glad I was there to let Americans know how he conducted himself overseas on their behalf.
“I Think He Wants the President”
News of America’s military men and women who were wounded and killed in Iraq and Afghanistan almost overwhelmed me on some days. I may have sounded strong when I was talking to the press, but sometimes I had to push my feelings way down in order to get any words out of my mouth to make statements and answer questions.
The hardest days were when President Bush went to visit the wounded or families of the fallen. If it was tough for me, you can only imagine what it was like for the families and for a President who knew that his decisions led his troops into battles where they fought valiantly but were severely injured or lost their lives. He regularly visited patients at Walter Reed military hospital near the White House. These stops were unannounced because of security concerns and hassles for the hospital staff that come with a full-blown Presidential visit.
One morning in 2005, Scott McClellan sent me in his place to visit the wounded warriors. It was my first time for that particular assignment, and I was nervous about how the visits would go. The President was scheduled to see twenty-five patients at Walter Reed. Many of them had traumatic brain injuries and were in very serious, sometimes critical, condition. Despite getting the best treatment available in the world, we knew that some would not survive.
We started in the intensive care unit. The Chief Naval Officer (CNO) briefed the President on our way into the hospital about the first patient we’d see. He was a young Marine who had been injured when his Humvee was hit by a roadside bomb. After his rescue, he was flown to Landstuhl U.S. Air Force Base in Kaiserslautern, Germany. At his bedside were his parents, wife, and five-year-old son.
“What’s his prognosis?” the President asked.
“Well, we don’t know sir, because he’s not opened his eyes since he arrived, so we haven’t been able to communicate with him. But no matter what, Mr. President, he has a long road ahead of him,” said the CNO.
We had to wear masks because of the risk of infection to the patient. I watched carefully to see how the family would react to President Bush, and I was worried that they might be mad at him and blame him for their loved one’s situation. But I was wrong. The family was so excited the President had come. They gave him big hugs and thanked him over and over. Then they wanted to get a photo. So he gathered them all in front of Eric Draper, the White House photographer. President Bush asked, “Is everybody smiling?” But they all had ICU masks on. A light chuckle ran through the room as everyone got the joke.
The soldier was intubated. The President talked quietly with the family at the foot of the patient’s bed. I looked up at the ceiling so that I could hold back tears.
After he visited with them for a bit, the President turned to the military aide and said, “Okay, let’s do the presentation.” The wounded soldier was being awarded the Purple Heart, given to troops that suffer wounds in combat.
Everyone stood silently while the military aide in a low and steady voice presented the award. At the end of it, the Marine’s little boy tugged on the President’s jacket and asked, “What’s a Purple Heart?”
The President got down on one knee and pulled the little boy closer to him. He said, “It’s an award for your dad, because he is very brave and courageous, and because he loves his country so much. And I hope you know how much he loves you and your mom, too.”
As he hugged the boy, there was a commotion from the medical staff as they moved toward the bed.
The Marine had just opened his eyes. I could see him from where I stood.
The CNO held the medical team back and said, “Hold on, guys. I think he wants the President.”
The President jumped up and rushed over to the side of the bed. He cupped the Marine’s face in his hands. They locked eyes, and after a couple of moments the President, without breaking eye contact, said to the military aide, “Read it again.”
So we stood silently as the military aide presented the Marine with the award for a second time. The President had tears dripping from his eyes onto the Marine’s face. As the presentation ended, the President rested his forehead on the Marine’s for a moment. Now everyone was crying, and for so many reasons: the sacrifice; the pain and suffering; the love of country; the belief in the mission; and the witnessing of a relationship between a soldier and his Commander in Chief that the rest of us could never fully grasp. (In writing this book, I contacted several military aides who helped me track down the name of the Marine. I hoped for news that he had survived. He did not. He died during surgery six days after the President’s visit. He is buried at Arlington Cemetary and is survived by his wife and their three children.)
And that was just the first patient we saw. For the rest of the visit to the hospital that day, almost every family had the same reaction of joy when they saw the President. But there were exceptions. One mom and dad of a dying soldier from the Caribbean were devastated, the mom beside herself with grief. She yelled at the President, wanting to know why it was her child and not his who lay in that hospital bed. Her husband tried to calm her and I noticed the President wasn’t in a hurry to leave—he tried offering comfort but then just stood and took it, like he expected and needed to hear the anguish, to try to soak up some of her suffering if he could.
Later as we rode back on Marine One to the White House, no one spoke.
But as the helicopter took off, the President looked at me and said, “That mama sure was mad at me.” Then he turned to look out the window of the helicopter. “And I don’t blame her a bit.”
One tear slipped out the side of his eye and down his face. He didn’t wipe it away, and we flew back to the White House.
Oh, Vlad…
The responsibilities of a deputy press secretary are to gather intelligence on what the press is going to ask at the briefings or of the President, answer the questions they can, and facilitate interviews and prepare talking points for them. That meant hanging out with the reporters on the road and dropping by their cramped offices in the West Wing to shoot the breeze, gossip, and get the lay of the land. One of the deputies always went with the press corps on the chartered plane before a Presidential trip—usually reporters leave a half a day before the President for a domestic trip, and a full twenty-four hours before Air Force One for foreign travel.
I had only been working in the White House press office a few weeks in 2005 when I was assigned to go with the press to Europe, where the President was having several meetings, including a one-on-one with Russian President Vladimir Putin. After that meeting, they were scheduled to hold a press conference where they would take two questions each.
By this time, the President and Putin knew each other fairly well and had a rather complicated relationship. I came along well after Bush had said that he looked into Putin’s eyes and gotten a sense of his soul (years later Bush explained that the leaders had just met and had spoken about Putin’s mother and the cross she’d had blessed in Jerusalem that she had given to her son—that was the context for the comment). Putin and Bush cooperated well on some things, such as sharing intelligence to prevent more terrorist attacks, but were in strong disagreement about other things, including the war in Iraq and Iran’s intentions for a nuclear weapon.
In the ultimate dig at the President a year earlier, Putin showed how competitive and petty he was when he insulted Barney, the President’s beloved Scottish terrier. While the President was in Russia, Putin took President Bush outside to see his dog. The hound was loose and running around. Putin crossed his arms over his chest and sa
id, “See? Bigger, faster, and stronger than Barney.” You have to imagine he wasn’t really talking about his dog.
I had specific instructions that I should listen for what reporters were interested in that day and gather any intelligence about the kinds of questions that the leaders could expect at the press conference. The communications director, Dan Bartlett, reminded me to include in my briefing for President Bush and President Putin that the American press corps was likely to ask about press freedoms in Russia (this was a regular topic that was asked anytime our press had a chance to question Putin, and I silently cheered them on).
I had never briefed a foreign leader before, and up to then had only had limited interaction with President Bush. I was waiting in the holding area so that I’d be in place for the briefing. I’d been diligent about getting a sense of the questions that would come up, and I knew that I needed to be thorough and concise. The last thing I wanted was to have them blindsided by one of the reporters.
President Bush came in first and he said, “Okay, what do you have?” Putin stood near him, expressionless except for his steel blue eyes. He’s a cool customer.
I told the leaders the topics and questions that I thought would be asked, and then I added the bit about a question on media freedom in Russia. I was looking at President Bush but I gathered my courage and finished my sentence looking directly at Putin.
President Bush looked at Putin and asked, “You all set?” wanting to be sure that Putin had understood everything I’d said.
“Why would I answer any questions about press freedoms in my country, when you just fired that newsman,” Putin said.
“Excuse me?” Bush asked.
“You know, you fired that newsman.”
The President looked puzzled but then he realized what was going on. He said, “Vladimir, are you talking about Dan Rather?”
“Yes, the man you fired.”
“No, Vladimir, that’s not how it works. A private company employed Dan Rather, and they made the decision to let him go. I had nothing to do with it,” the President explained. “I’m telling you as your friend, don’t go out there and say that. It isn’t correct.” He was trying to educate Putin about the free press and to spare the Russian leader embarrassment on the world stage.
But Putin wasn’t buying it. It was an interesting look into how a former KGB officer viewed the United States. And sure enough, a reporter asked a question about press freedoms in Moscow and Putin gave the answer he had planned to give. The reporters looked confused until they figured out what was going on. They tried not to snicker, and I suppressed an instinct to feel embarrassed for Putin. No one should ever feel sorry for him.
Can I Throw Him Under the Bus First?
The very most important lesson I learned from the President was about forgiveness.
In May 2008, during the middle of the Presidential primary campaign, a former White House colleague released a book that received a lot of news coverage. In general, the book was considered quite negative about the President, and of course the media thought it was extra juicy because the author was former White House press secretary Scott McClellan.
Scott and I had been friends since my first days at the Justice Department when I was his contact for all of the energy and environmental lawsuits. We bonded further when I was at the White House Council on Environmental Quality. Our spouses got along well, too, and we’d get invited to their house, where Scott’s wife, Jill, would make homemade popovers, short ribs, and molten chocolate cake. In January 2005, Scott hired me to replace one of his deputies, Claire Buchan Parker, who was moving up to be chief of staff at the Commerce Department. He took great care to show me the ropes, even drawing a diagram of Marine One’s seats for me so that I wouldn’t worry about where to sit when on my first trip with the President.
Despite Scott’s hard work and determination, his briefings were unnecessarily heated and often ineffective. That wasn’t entirely his fault as there were many circumstances that fed into the chaos, including the initial implementation of Medicare Part D, the response to Hurricane Katrina, the Supreme Court nominations, and the ongoing investigation of Scooter Libby and Karl Rove over the Valerie Plame issue (there are many more—we had more than enough on our plates in the press office). Scott failed to gain a foothold and lost the confidence of many reporters and some senior staff in the White House. The President, however, did not blame him for the bad press coverage and remained loyal to him.
But eventually it became clear that in order to change the dynamics of the White House communications, there needed to be a change of press secretary. When the new chief of staff, Joshua Bolten, took over in 2006, one of the decisions he made was to replace Scott with media star, master communicator, and former Presidential speechwriter, Tony Snow. Though we knew internally that Scott was being fired, we managed to maintain in the press that after six years of being on the campaign and in the White House, Scott was going to move on to the next great opportunity in front of him. Even if the press suspected the change was because of an inability to effectively deliver a message, they didn’t throw Scott to the wolves. He was personally well liked by many of the reporters.
Fast-forward. The night before Thanksgiving in 2007, I was the press secretary and was up at Camp David with the President and Mrs. Bush for their interview with Charlie Gibson of Good Morning America. My BlackBerry was buzzing me constantly, so I checked my messages one last time before I left for home.
The e-mails were from reporters asking for comment about a report that Scott’s memoir was due out in May 2008 and that it was described in a prepublication sales pitch as one that would reveal information that would reflect badly on President Bush.
I knew Scott was writing a book, but that was not how he’d described it to me. These reports seemed out of character and I assumed it was the publisher’s marketing people trying to make the book sound juicier than it was going to be.
Ed Gillespie, counselor to the President, was with me.
“Ed, don’t you think you should tell the President about this before we go?” I asked.
“Yes, I think you should,” he said, pushing me in front of him.
All of us had become skilled in delivering bad news, but no one relished it—especially not on the night before Thanksgiving.
The President walked us to our vehicles to say good-bye.
I hated to sour the mood, but I had to. I said, “Sir, before we go, there’s just one little thing that you may see in the news over the weekend.” I described the messages to him.
“Scott wouldn’t do that to me, would he?” the President asked.
“No, sir, I don’t think he would,” I said, though I was worried. Rarely is anything that wrong by the time it hits the press.
“Let’s call him,” he said.
“Right now?” I asked.
“Yeah. Let’s call and ask him.”
They had known each other for many years. I imagine that Scott had once felt as close to the President as I did, so the President thought nothing of just calling him up to ask what was going on.
I met eyes with Jared Weinstein, the President’s aide. He was shaking his head no. I think he didn’t want to completely disrupt the President’s holiday.
As luck would have it, I didn’t have Scott’s new phone number. I told the President I would track him down. My plan was to use the White House switchboard, where dedicated staff was able to connect us to anyone in the world at any time. I said I’d call back to Camp David after I’d straightened things out (though I had a sinking feeling I wasn’t going to succeed).
It took me a while to reach Scott, but when we were finally connected, the tone was chilly. At first, he said that the publisher’s description was over the top. I suggested he try to get a correction and he said he’d rather just let it ride. I advised him that that was unwise. I knew that this little blurb for a sales pitch to bookstores would brand Scott as a traitor among his friends and a hero (for a while) to the Left.
I made gentle suggestions, and then the more he talked, the more alarmed I became for him personally—with this move, he would find it very hard to have any future employer trust him. I knew this was going to hurt the President, because of the sheer disloyalty it displayed. And the press would have a field day.
I told Scott I’d call him back. I phoned the White House and asked my deputies, Tony Fratto, Scott Stanzel, and Gordon Johndroe, to stay until I got back. I didn’t want to detain them the night before Thanksgiving, but I needed their support. They didn’t mind—we all could see the coming train wreck.
I got back to the West Wing, gathered my staff in my office, and called Scott once more (but I didn’t put it on speaker). I told him I thought there was still time for him to fix this. I saw the personal public relations disaster that was about to rain down on him and the President. While I knew the President could weather it, I wasn’t so sure about Scott. I told him I worried about what this would do to his and Jill’s future. Well, that did it. He blew his top.
“Where the f*ck was the White House’s concern for my future when it hung me out to dry?” I knew he didn’t mean me personally, because I was just the messenger. I realized he was too angry for me to smooth anything over, so I just let him vent. Though we’d all played like he left the White House voluntarily, Scott must have felt stung and he wanted to get his version out there. Once he wrote the book, however, it was clear to everyone he’d not left on his terms. I wish that had always remained a mystery, but if it was going to be confirmed, it was better that he did it himself.
My team sat with me in the office while I was on the call. It was a rare moment when none of us could think of anything to say, and it was one of the only times I cried in front of anyone at the White House. We’d all worked with Scott and liked him personally. “Such a sweet guy,” you’d hear from everyone, including reporters. But that night we knew we’d just lost a friend. I told them that Scott’s life would never be the same and that his potential for a great post–White House career in communications was ruined. The worst part was that I knew the President would feel betrayed and any slight against him was one that I felt as well.