The political theater of Kayleigh McEnany’s scripted walk-offs

McEnany was ready for this one.

Quickly flipping pages in her briefing binder, McEnany launched into an extended critique of the New York Times, which broke the Russia story last week. Reading from her notes, she rattled off a series of alleged errors published by the Times in its reporting about Russia over the past four years, including a claim that 17 intelligence agencies had agreed about Russian interference in the 2016 election. (Only four agencies had done so.)

Then she unleashed the uppercut punch: “It is inexcusable, the failed Russia reporting of the New York Times. And I think it’s time that the New York Times, and also The Washington Post, hand back their Pulitzers.”

And with that, McEnany snapped her binder shut and strode out of the briefing room, trailed by the unanswered shouts and murmurs of the White House press corps.

Such dramatic exits have become a signature of McEnany’s brief tenure as press secretary. Since taking the job in April, the former Trump-friendly CNN pundit and spokeswoman for Trump’s reelection campaign has often waited until the briefing’s conclusion — that is, the moment when she determines the briefing is concluded — to unload on the assembled reporters.

The excoriation is typically punctuated by a binder slam and a determined stride away from the lectern, almost like the slugger who doesn’t bother to watch the pitch he just swatted as it sails into the bleacher seats. The unspoken message seems to be: Take that, hacks!

McEnany, for example, concluded her briefing on June 1 by playing a White House-produced video of police embracing protesters, images that she said “have not been played all that often” in the news media.

And when she was asked in early May if she wanted to take back her assertion in a Fox Business Network interview in February that “we will not see diseases like the coronavirus come here,” McEnany responded by rhetorically asking if news organizations would like to take back articles that had downplayed the threat. After rattling off several of them, she delivered her exit line: “I’ll leave you with those questions and maybe you’ll have some answers in a few days.”

During another very special McEnany moment in May, the press secretary closed things out by narrating an illustrated PowerPoint presentation of five questions she said reporters should pose to Obama administration officials in support of Trump’s claims of a conspiracy against him.

“If I write them out in a slide format — maybe we’re visual learners and you guys will follow up with journalistic curiosity,” she said sarcastically in introducing her lecture. Sounding like a teacher handing out an assignment, she concluded: “It’s a long weekend. You guys have three days to follow up on those questions. And I certainly hope the next time I ask, some hands go up, because Obama’s spokesperson…