«I know that what has been requested…»
Tuesday’s White House press briefing saw press secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders field a number of questions about former White House aide Rob Porter.
However, it got pretty intense when American Urban Radio Networks White House correspondent April Ryan pressed Sanders on the issue.
Ryan asked:
“In light of everything that’s going on, is there a review now? An internal review of all those who have interim security clearances to see if they should stay or should they should go?”
Sanders responded: “I can’t speak about whether or not different staff have interim or permanent security clearances.”
Ryan repeated her question, despite being told that Sanders didn’t have an answer.
“That determination would be made outside of anything I can walk you through at this point,” Sanders said.
Then, Ryan brought up the Violence Against Woman Act, a piece of legislation President Donald Trump plans to fund in the upcoming budget.
Ryan said:
“You said the president’s going to fully fund the reauthorization of the Violence Against Woman Act. It’s up in March. What is he putting in?”
“I’d have to look at the specific number,” Sanders replied. “But it was rolled out in the budget that was presented yesterday.”
Ryan said that she mentioned it but asked, “Is the number the number that’s always been? Or was it just done?”
At which point Sanders fired back: “I know that what has been requested has been put into the president’s budget. It was in the budget that was rolled yesterday that’s been part of the ongoing process. We don’t write a budget like in 20 minutes, so it’s been part of something that’s been ongoing.”
“I understand that, but there’s some things in that budget Mr. Mulvaney did not tell us about yesterday,” Ryan remarked.
“That means you probably didn’t ask those questions. I’m going to keep going,” Sanders said, cutting Ryan off as she took the next question.
