Center for Strategic and International Studies Bob Schieffer’s “About the News” with H. Andrew Schwartz Podcast Subject: “Politico’s Tara Palmeri: A Reporter With Sources” Speakers: Tara Palmeri, White House Correspondent, Politico Hosts: H. Andrew Schwartz, Senior Vice President for External Relations, CSIS Bob Schieffer, CBS Political News Contributor; Former Host, “Face the Nation,” CBS News Date: Monday, August 7, 2017 Transcript By Superior Transcriptions LLC www.superiortranscriptions.com (Music plays.) BOB SCHIEFFER: I’m Bob Schieffer. H. ANDREW SCHWARTZ: And I’m Andrew Schwartz. MR. SCHIEFFER: And these are conversations about the news. We’re in the midst of a communications revolution. We have access to more information than any people in history. But are we more informed, or just overwhelmed by so much information we can’t process it? MR. SCHWARTZ: Our podcast is a collaboration of the Bob Schieffer College of Communication at TCU and CSIS in Washington. MR. SCHIEFFER: In this first year of Donald Trump’s presidency, we’re talking to the reporters who are covering the president the closest, the White House press corps. (Music plays.) MR. SCHIEFFER: Our guest today is Tara Palmeri, who Sean Spicer once called, quote, “An idiot with no real sources.” Which raises the question, whatever happened to Sean Spicer? TARA PALMERI: Right? (Laughter.) I think that the lesson here is don’t cross me. (Laughs.) MR. SCHWARTZ: I agree! MR. SCHIEFFER: You know what? If he’d have said that about me, I’d have put it on my tombstone. MS. PALMERI: I put it on my Twitter handle, which is basically the equivalent nowadays. And the great thing about it is, like, every time afterwards I was even more dedicated to breaking news and really getting under his skin by proving him wrong. So I thank him for that. MR. SCHIEFFER: I would say, without doing a thorough fact check, that your stories have been more correct than his has. If you – MS. PALMERI: Oh, definitely. (Laughter.) Definitely. MR. SCHIEFFER: Tara, is, as you may have guessed by now, and probably already know if you follow the news, is the White House correspondent for Politico. As of May 2017 she became a CNN political analyst. And you had – and because a lot of young journalists and people who want to be journalists are part of our audience, tell us how you got to Politico from – and where did you start? MS. PALMERI: My journey was very windy. It started in TV, being a news assistant for CNN. It was right after the inauguration of Obama – actually, it was the inauguration of Obama. They needed helpers. I graduated early from college because I just really wanted to start working in the business. MR. SCHIEFFER: Where’d you go to school? MS. PALMERI: I went to American University. And so I really wanted to start working in the business. I had been interning at Voice of America. And I was able to get, through a referral there, to help out with the inauguration as a news assistant. I was freelance, you know, working hourly. And I did that for about nine months. And I kept making contacts with – well, I would produce stories on the side and I would work on the political ticker. But I also was making connections with a lot of the guests who were editors at various newspapers in Washington. And so I ended up moving on from there to be a columnist at the Washington Examiner. I wrote their daily yeas and nays column, which was really fun because it’s a – it was a gossip column, but, you know, you got to really know a lot of the players in D.C., write about politicians. And some of my stories really made news. We really built the website up from there. We were getting over – almost 2 million views per month on this page, breaking stories. And then I ended up getting the attention of the New York Post because of a story that I broke about Eliot Spitzer moving onto CNN. And at the time people said: No way. This girl is crazy. This is wrong. It’s wrong. Guess what? He ended up at CNN. And so the New York Post loved stories about Eliot Spitzer. That was, like, our sweet spot, you know? Anthony Weiner, Eliot Spitzer, those are – Alec Baldwin, Keith Olbermann – those were – you know, we had a story about – MR. SCHWARTZ: Scaramucci. MS. PALMERI: Yeah. No, they love Scaramucci, though. They don’t hate Scaramucci, which is funny. So I ended up getting a position at the New York Post at Page Six, it’s just, like, the iconic gossip column. And did I go to college thinking I was going to be a gossip columnist? No. But I saw it as an opportunity at a huge newspaper. Moved to New York and I did that. And I stayed there for about a year. Then I worked in the news desk and I chased big stories all over the country as a, you know, traveling reporter. And then I went on to cover city hall at the New York Post, which is really a great place to be because the paper is quite powerful in New York City especially, their local coverage. And from there, I decided to do something completely different, scrub the tabloid off me, and I went to Europe and I covered Brexit. I covered the Greek financial crisis. I helped Politico Europe open their offices in Brussels because I have a dual citizenship. I’m also Polish because of my mother. And I lived there. It was an amazing experience. I learned about the European Union. I was based in their – basically their Washington of Europe. And I got to see the whole – you know, the whole continent and cover all types of stories, which actually are so similar. I mean, I covered Brexit. That was my story. I went on the campaign. I went to the UKIP, you know, conference. I got to know Nigel Farage and the leaders and also David Cameron and all of these players. And it’s just so similar to what was happening on our side of the pond. And then after Trump won, I knew Trump from when I was at the New York Post. He used to call me when I was at Page Six. (Laughs.) MR. SCHIEFFER: Really? MS. PALMERI: Yeah. He liked to get into Page Six, especially when his political aspirations were, you know, bubbling up in 2012. And my boss though, you know what? Let’s bring her back and this seems like the right story for her, having the background of being a tabloid reporter – you know, the reporter that he would deal with mostly – and having covered, you know, some heavy populist issues in Europe. So that’s my story. Very winding. It’s been about – MR. SCHWARTZ: Did he call you – did he call you as himself, or did he call you as – MS. PALMERI: No, he called me as himself, yeah. MR. SCHWARTZ: OK. MR. SCHIEFFER: (Laughs.) MS. PALMERI: Yeah. It was a different relationship. The relationship with the New York Post was different than, I think, with other reporters because, you know, his long-time assistant, Rhona Graff, you would just call her if you wanted to talk to Donald Trump. She wasn’t his publicist, but he didn’t really need a publicist. He would do it himself. If you wanted any information about the – any of the properties, you would call Ivanka, and she would handle that, almost as a, you know, spokesperson for the properties. It was really just – they felt very comfortable with the New York Post. They had been dealing with them for a very long time. I don’t think there was a feeling that they would get burned by the New York Post, especially since he was such a regular person there. I mean, even if you wanted a quote about someone who had just passed away, a celebrity, you would call and get a quote from Donald Trump. He was really easy to deal with. I remember, though, at one point the editor in chief at the time, Col Allan, said: You know, we can’t keep writing about Donald Trump running for president. It’s just not happening. It’s been in Page Six almost every day this week. Like, enough with the Donald Trump stories. So I remember he called me, and I was at the Republican National Convention for the New York Post. And he wanted – he said he had just spoken to John McCain and he still thinks that he has a chance at the nomination. And I said – I was like, OK, interesting. Thank you, Mr. Trump. But of course, I couldn’t write about it. At that point, I’d already been told – Mitt Romney was just nominated anyway. I mean, there was no chance at the nomination unless he was – you know, it was just interesting. It was kind of crazy. It was the last conversation I think I had with him and I think I was, like, 24, 25 at the time, so. MR. SCHIEFFER: It’s very interesting to me, because when you think about you, when you think about Maggie Haberman, you think about Glenn Thrush – MS. PALMERI: Annie Karni. MR. SCHIEFFER: Annie Karni. MS. PALMERI: Yeah, we all worked at the New York Post. Except Glenn worked at Newsday. MR. SCHIEFFER: He was at Newsday. But you were all tabloid reporters.