I’m signing up to the theory that Trump isn’t going to make four years. For a long time (wait, it’s only been three weeks? Feels like three years) I thought that once Trump had power he would want to keep it. But if freaking Saturday Night Live can rattle this administration (and maybe this story isn’t true but it certainly sounds plausible given Trump’s outraged tweets at previous sketches) then there’s no way they can keep this together for an entire term.
As the press secretary for a president who’s obsessed with how things play on cable TV, Sean Spicer’s real audience during his daily televised press briefings has always been an audience of one.
And the devastating “Saturday Night Live” caricature of Spicer that aired over the weekend — in which a belligerent Spicer was spoofed by a gum-chomping, super soaker-wielding Melissa McCarthy in drag — did not go over well internally at a White House in which looks matter.
More than being lampooned as a press secretary who makes up facts, it was Spicer’s portrayal by a woman that was most problematic in the president’s eyes, according to sources close to him. And the unflattering send-up by a female comedian was not considered helpful for Spicer’s longevity in the grueling, high-profile job in which he has struggled to strike the right balance between representing an administration that considers the media the “opposition party,” and developing a functional relationship with the press.
“Trump doesn’t like his people to look weak,” added a top Trump donor.