Spicer took a leaf out of President Trump’s campaign notebook by acting more like a celebrity, and less like a politician, by giving a notable, controversial speech at the 2017 Emmys.
The lesson? You don’t have to be accountable if you’re a celebrity.
Sean Spicer served as the White House’s Press Secretary and as the Communications Director under President Trump in 2017.
Under the Trump Administration, Spicer has been caught in a myriad of lies.
Spicer, acting as White House Press Secretary, defended the wiretapping allegations against former President Obama, which were later proved to be false.
“There is no question something happened,” Spicer said. “The question is, is it surveillance, is it a wiretap, or whatever.”
When FBI director, James Comey, disproved President Trump’s wiretapping claims, and asked the Justice Department to publicly reject it, Spicer was quick to backtrack and explain that wiretapping did not literally mean physical taps on President Trump’s phone.
Spicer said, “If you look at the president’s tweet, he said very clearly quote — ‘wiretapping’ — end quote.”
In addition, Spicer also accused former President Obama of using the British intelligence agency (GCHQ) to tap President Trump’s phone.
In addition to accusing former President Obama of wiretapping President Trump, Spicer’s other notable lies are Trump winning the most electoral votes of any Republican since Reagan and that Trump’s inauguration was the most watched presidential inauguration of all time.
George H.W. Bush was the last Republican with the most electoral votes.
According to the New York Times, “[T]here have been 45 presidential elections [out of 58 total] in which the winning candidate won a larger share of the electoral vote.” Which would rank Trump’s electoral college victory in 46th place.
President Trump’s inauguration was not the most watched inaguration of all time.
According to the Washington Post, “Trump trailed several prior presidents. He falls into fifth place since 1969, behind Obama in 2009, Richard Nixon in 1973, Jimmy Carter in 1977 and the high-water mark of Ronald Reagan in 1981.”
After being caught in lie after lie, and getting out of those lies with more lies, you would think that Spicer’s political career would be over with, or at the very least, wouldn’t be given a platform at the Emmys.
Spicer being allowed to speak at the Emmys could be seen as a way to slyly demean him, rather than make his prior actions somehow acceptable through humor. But, that’s exactly what has happened.
By allowing Spicer to control the narrative about him and turn it into something humorous, it desensatizes us to his actions.
Instead of us laughing at or criticizing Spicer through that speech, he is laughing with us at mistakes he’s carefully chosen to criticize.
In doing so, Spicer has hope to turn what would be a series of lies into a comedy skit, written and controlled by him.
CNN’s Anderson Cooper has recently spoke on Spicer. Spicer has repeatedly attacked CNN, assisting President Trump in calling CNN “fake news.”
During an interview by ABC News, Spicer was asked if he ever lied to the American people and responded with, “I don’t think so.”
Cooper replayed the clip of that exchange and offered his criticism of Spicer.
“See, he’s making a joke of the fact that he lied,” Cooper said. “I guess the idea is, if you let some time pass, lies become funny.”
The desensitization of deplorable actions by virtue of being a celebrity is nothing new, but when applied to the government, it has terrible implications, some of which are being brought to life through Spicer.
James Cantu
Opinion Editor