It’s Been A Year And We Still Don’t Know Which Top Official Wrote That NYT Op-Ed

WASHINGTON, DC - FEBRUARY 15 : President Donald J. Trump departs after speaking about "the national security and humanitarian crisis on our southern border" and declare a national emergency as a means to circumvent C... WASHINGTON, DC - FEBRUARY 15 : President Donald J. Trump departs after speaking about "the national security and humanitarian crisis on our southern border" and declare a national emergency as a means to circumvent Congress and build additional border barriers, in the Rose Garden at the White House on Friday, Feb. 15, 2019 in Washington, DC. (Photo by Jabin Botsford/The Washington Post via Getty Images) MORE LESS
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Despite the White House’s best efforts, the author of the anonymous White House resistance op-ed in the New York Times a year ago is still under wraps.

After President Trump tweeted in outrage — claiming the Times had just made up the article and suggesting the author, a “senior official,” might have committed “TREASON” in penning it — the White House opened an investigation into finding the author. The White House’s sweeping probe consisted of aides compiling a list of suspects. There was also reportedly talk of making staffers take a lie-detector test or making sworn statements, but the efforts were to no avail, according to the Washington Post.

Only five people know the identify of the author: New York Times publisher A.G. Sulzberger, editorial page editor James Bennet, op-ed editor James Dao, the “intermediary” between the Times and the official and the author him or herself. As the Post noted, it’s possible someone in the administration knows who the author is as well, given the person described a conversation disparaging Trump with another top official in the original op-ed.

Bennet and Dao declined to be interviewed by the Post about the one-year anniversary of the op-ed, which has been largely forgotten in the wake of ongoing Trump administration controversy.

“As we said a year ago, this op-ed offered a significant first-person perspective that had not yet been presented to Times readers, describing the efforts made by some inside to carry out policies they believed in while containing what they saw as the President’s troubling impulses,” Bennet told the Post in a statement. “The substance of that piece has been borne out by reporting at The Times and elsewhere over the past year.”

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Notable Replies

  1. The truth will come out. Donald Trump is a Russian asset.

    Putin says I’m brilliant!
    (Donald Trump)

  2. The White House’s sweeping probe consisted of aides compiling a list of suspects.

    That’s pretty funny.

     

    Bennet and Dao declined to be interviewed by the Post about the one-year anniversary of the op-ed

    That’s pretty unfunny.

    I’m not sure which would be worse: that Bennett and Dao used the phrase in their statement or that TPM’s writers don’t know how illiterate it is.

  3. Avatar for pshah pshah says:

    Caution: plot spoiler.

    Like Murder on the Orient Express, they probably all had a hand in it. An ineffectual version of the 25th Amendment as befits this inept Administration.

  4. My money’s on Kellyanne Conway. George plays the enemy of the admin in his tweets and commentary, KC plays the loyal trumpite, and when trumpism is over, they’ll both emerge with job offers waiting for them.

    @krusher

  5. Whoever it was is a weasel. Trying to make the public believe that there’s some form of control over events, policies, diplomacy happening in the WH. The op-ed struck me as propaganda at the time. Still does.

    Looking forward to 2020.

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