It was close to midnight when I had to kill a column
I’d already filed for Fox News and write about the Michael Flynn
resignation.
The inescapable irony: The spiked column said that
some positive stories for President Trump, such as his meetings with the
leaders of Canada and Japan, were being drowned out by the
controversies surrounding the White House—some self-inflicted, some
overblown by the media.
The Flynn situation was another battle between the
president and the press, and in this case the Washington Post story
about the national security adviser’s contacts with the Russian
ambassador made it impossible for Flynn to survive. Unlike some of the
stories dismissed by Trump as fake news, this one could not be waved
away—especially because Flynn had misled Mike Pence about what happened
in those pre-inaugural conversations.
This was good reporting, and Pence’s televised
defense of Flynn was based on an earlier piece by Post columnist David
Ignatius, disclosing that Flynn had a post-Christmas call with Russian
Ambassador Sergey Kislyak.
At the same time, the Post story would not have been
possible without the cooperation of nine unnamed senior officials who
furnished the leaked information. They wanted Flynn out and were trying
to undermine the president.
Trump, who has also been hit by unflattering leaks
about his calls with foreign leaders, seized on this issue. “The real
story here is why are there so many illegal leaks coming out of
Washington?” he tweeted. “Will these leaks be happening as I deal on
N.Korea etc?”
But it must be said that the leakers’ information was
right on target. And that in the end Flynn’s problem was not so much
discussing U.S. sanctions with Russia before Trump took office as
misleading the VP, as Kellyanne Conway stressed on the morning shows
yesterday.
The messaging has been decidedly mixed. Conway, based
on the information she had, told MSNBC on Monday afternoon that the
president had full confidence in Flynn. Hours later he resigned.
Conway insisted in her interviews on “Today,” “GMA”
and “Fox & Friends” that it was the retired lieutenant general’s
choice to resign. But when Sean Spicer briefed the press yesterday
afternoon, he flatly said that Trump asked for Flynn’s
resignation—meaning he fired him—after things reached critical mass.
The debacle doesn’t end the story, as often happens when a top official is forced out under a cloud.
The Post reported yesterday
that Acting Attorney General Sally Yates warned the White House three
weeks ago that Flynn was potentially vulnerable to Russian blackmail and
that she believed he had misled administration officials about the
calls. Yates is the Obama holdover later fired by Trump for refusing to
defend his temporary travel ban.
That revelation raises the serious question of why
the White House didn’t act sooner on that warning, well before any of
this became public, and just what the president knew about these
matters.
Now there’s media chatter about whether these events will lead to a broader White House shakeup.
And here’s a footnote: Michael G. Flynn, the former
official’s son, drew attention last year for tweeting about various
conspiracy theories, including the “Pizzagate” fiction tying Hillary
Clinton to a supposed child sex ring at a Washington restaurant. It was
Mike Pence who said that Flynn’s son had nothing to do with the Trump
transition team. But that was wrong, and officials soon confirmed that
Trump had fired the younger Flynn from the transition team over the
tweets.
Flynn Jr. reactivated his account and tweeted yesterday: “The disinformation campaign against my father won.”
Howard Kurtz is a Fox News analyst and the host of "MediaBuzz" (Sundays 11 a.m. and 5 p.m. ET). He is the author of five books and is based in Washington. Follow him at @HowardKurtz. Click here for more information on Howard Kurtz.