Politico Playbook writer Anna Palmer pulled a Mel Gibson last Thursday night at the Four Seasons hotel in Washington’s Georgetown neighborhood when she approached a civilized gathering of President Trump allies and incoherently blasted them for apparently being on the wrong side of America’s political divide.
The group of eight to ten people had drinks at the bar and moved the party to a table between 9 p.m. and 10 p.m.
That’s when Palmer approached.
Initially, they didn’t realize who she was. The group included Breitbart News‘s Washington Editor Matt Boyle, Alexandra Preate, a longtime associate of Trump Senior Advisor Steve Bannon, GOP operative Arthur Schwartz and a handful of senior Trump administration officials.
Most of the attendees declined to comment on the record.
A Mirror spy told me, “We’re sitting there having dinner. She comes over to our table like fall-down drunk. I just looked up and there is this woman yelling at us, lecturing us. It was like a crazy homeless person coming up to you on the street and rambling.”
Word leaked to Politico superiors, who sent out an email to find out what happened. According to sources, Palmer easily fessed up. She didn’t remember what happened but said something to the effect of, ‘They were sitting down and I was standing up so it must have been my fault.'”
The source, who was spotted in the East Wing on Friday, described her as “slurring her points. Unintelligible. Republicans. Corrupt. Bad. Like, can’t finish a sentence. She keeps on keepin’ on. It was pronounced because none of us were drinking heavily. We all had early days the next day. She was wagging her finger at us. She’s one of the faces of Politico. We’re all Republicans. We all have pretty close ties to the White House.”
The spy reasoned, “We’re not crazy people. Whatever she thinks of our politics, half of us were either going to the White House for politics or work the next day.”
Another dinner attendee remarked, “She stumbled from like three tables over. I was on my third drink. She was there, and she was just loud and really sloppy. It looked like she spilled something on herself. Slurring words. She practically like knocked over…she put her hand on my shoulder…and almost knocked over my drink on me, which would’ve been a disaster. I helped her to the door.”
The second spy said the waiter decided to stop serving them because of Palmer. “I would tell you if we were drunk, I don’t care. We weren’t. They cut us off because of her.”
The source added, “We were joking around about fake news.” She started saying, “‘Ohhh…fuck you guys!’ She blacked out. I felt bad for her frankly. She was having a bad night. It happens. She said the White House was a joke. Some of it may have been in jest.”
Someone from the party went to get the restaurant staff to tell her to leave.
But Palmer ultimately left on her own accord.
“She stumbled out,” said the eyewitness.
In a climate when news outlets like CNN are constantly getting broiled for being “fake news,” the incident has larger implications of Politico‘s possible bias against Republicans. “That was unfiltered bias,” my source remarked. “Playbook is her without the drinks in her.”
The Mirror requested comment from Palmer as well as Politico spokesman Brad Dayspring.
Politico Director of Communications Katie Padwell called me back to offer a vastly different version of the story.
“At this point I think its kind of a she said, he said,” Padwell told The Mirror by phone. “The take I have from her…when she walked in, they were pretty aggressive, yelling ‘Fake news! Fake News!’ Ultimately she left because she was uncomfortable. Usually people are loud in a bar and things can be misinterpreted. Anna walks into a bar. An aggressive group [starts talking to her]. She left on her own.”
Palmer is en route to Los Angeles.
#HasAnnaLandedYet?