Sarah Sanders will sometimes bring a special guest to give remarks at the beginning of a White House press briefing.
The guest is typically a member of the administration, who is pushing an agenda item that week.
With the minor chaos engulfing the White House over the past few days, the press room held its breath when Sanders announced Thursday afternoon that she had brought a special guest to address them. The TVs then turned on behind her and the President of the United States could be seen on screen, talking about the GOP Victory on tax reform.
The president said in part:
The historic tax cut I signed into law just two weeks ago before Christmas is already delivering major economic gains. Hundreds of thousands of Americans are seeing larger paychecks, bigger bonuses, higher pension contribution, and it is all because of the tax cuts and a tax reform, and I want to thank all of the companies that work so hard to do it. Workers at AT&T, Bank of America, Comcast, Southwest Airlines, American Airlines, and many other companies are receiving bonuses of $1000 or more. Aflac, others are investing more in employees 401(k)s. CBS announced that it will hire 3000 new workers. Boeing and another great company is investing hundreds of millions of dollars in employee trading and infrastructure. More than 60 companies have announced they are raising wages, including many that have voluntarily raised with their minimum wage to $15 per hour, and I mean, they did that voluntarily, which many politicians said could only be achieved by a government mandate.
Sanders followed by saying “Thank you Mr. President. As I said, this is only the beginning, we are excited to see the economic growth and optimism continued to soar in 2018,” and opened up the floor for questions.
When Trump appeared onscreen, reporters in the room and on social media began to groan. Many complained that the video message was being delivered while Trump was just a couple rooms over working in the Oval Office:
Other reporters had more colorful commentary:
This may be one creative way for Trump to have his weekly video addresses seen by a larger audience, even if the Press did not appreciate it.