President Donald Trump’s new communications adviser has a message for White House staff — keep leaking illegal information to the liberal media, and everyone — from top to bottom — will be fired.
Anthony Scaramucci told Fox News on Sunday that it was time to hit the “reset button” with the media to communicate Trump’s message with “good feeling” and hopes to “create a more positive mojo.”
Scaramucci also promised to crack down on information leaks at the same time he pledged to help bridge the gap between the White House and the media.
To that end, Scaramucci suggested changes to come, noting: “I have in my pocket a radio studio, a television studio, and a movie studio. The entire world has changed; we need to rethink the way we’re delivering our information.”
Trump announced Friday that Scaramucci – a polished television commentator and Harvard Law graduate – would take over the administration’s top messaging job. The appointment came as the president contends with vicious media attacks and struggles to advance his legislative agenda through the establishment Congress.
The president has also been frustrated with the attention devoted to allegations of his election campaign’s connections to Russia, a rumor that no evidence has ever been found to support.
White House Press Secretary Sean Spicer abruptly resigned in protest over Scaramucci’s appointment. He will be replaced by his former deputy Sarah Huckabee Sanders.
The challenges for Scaramucci’s new role were evident in a series of interviews, where he discussed his plans for press strategy, but was beset by questions about the Russia investigation and the president’s Twitter feed.
The president frequently opts to directly speak to the public via Twitter. Scaramucci stressed on Fox that he would “let the president be the president,” adding that he wants to “help aid and abet his agenda.”
On the Russia stories, Scaramucci said on Fox that a “two-pronged approach” was needed, saying that “in some ways we want to deescalate things and have there be a level of diplomacy. In other ways, we want it to be very hard-hitting and war-like.”
Asked about the president’s tweets about the investigation on CBS’ “Face the Nation”, Scaramucci said “if he thinks it’s helpful to him, let him do it.”
He also said on CNN’s “State of the Union” that “we’re going to defend him very, very aggressively when there’s nonsensical stuff being said about him. And he will probably dial back some of those tweets.”
Scaramucci also said on CNN that an unnamed person told him that “if the Russians actually hacked this situation and spilled out those e-mails, you would have never seen it.”
The Associated Press contributed to this article