The Morning Briefing: Karoline Leavitt's Continued Manhandling of the Press Is Pure Poetry

Top O' the Briefing

Happy Thursday, dear Kruiser Morning Briefing friends. (It's the final week of preparation for the whirlwind book tour, and the Sine Qua Non Sequitur is hosting a Winston Churchill dress-alike prosecco tasting.)

Right off the bat, I would like to say how grateful I am to be on the side where we can say that a woman is "manhandling" someone and not have to deal with a gaggle of male feminist professors getting their gender neutral undergarments in a wad. Yeah, they're still out there, but conservatives aren't obligated to participate in the leftist manufactured outrage delusion.

We are all aware that President Trump has pulled this great country back from the brink of the leftist abyss twice now. Had the White House fallen into the hands of either Hillary Clinton or Kamala Harris, we would all be going through a rough patch that would end with a trip to a gulag that had a Mandarin-only mandate.

It's the worst kind of immersion to learn a foreign language.

I write a lot about the Trump 47 team because I continually marvel at what the major players on it are accomplishing. White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt is one of those major players and, thanks to the nature of her job, all of her best work is done on camera and we get to enjoy it.

Leavitt's latest bit of workplace brilliance occurred when CBS press hack Ed O'Keefe asked her "Where or when does the president believe he's been falsely called racist?"

No, really.

My Twitchy colleague Doug P. shared this priceless response from Leavitt in a post yesterday:

🚨 BREAKING: Karoline Leavitt just EMBARRASSED a reporter who asked, "When has Trump ever been falsely called a racist?!" 🤡

"You're KIDDING, right?!" 🤣

"I'm sure there's many people in THIS ROOM and on network television across the country who have accused him of the same."… pic.twitter.com/qSRxYJ9Ftd
— Eric Daugherty (@EricLDaugh) February 18, 2026

Leavitt is a polite assassin when dealing with the mainstream media Dem propagandists in the White House press corps. Her preparedness is her weapon. Leavitt is always ready for anything they throw at her. It is such a departure from her predecessors in the Biden administration who were constantly flustered and flailing despite dealing with reporters who were almost all friendlies.

It was, of course, easy to find examples of people calling President Trump a racist, and Doug's post features a few of them. The Democrats have been throwing "racist" around so reflexively since the Obama years that the probably don't even notice they're doing it anymore.

Like Vice President JD Vance, Secretary of State Marco Rubio, and her other heavy hitter administration colleagues, Leavitt understands that most of the media is hostile to Republicans and are not deserving of any respect. When they ask stupid questions, laugh in their faces and verbally smack them down. Repeat as necessary. They're all following the lead of the man at the top, of course.

If the Republican Party is to survive, all of its elected officials need to get on board with that attitude. As I keep reminding everyone, the Democrats aren't going to become less insane after President Trump is out of office. And the MSM leftist lap dogs are not going to suddenly decide to become objective journalists. Republicans have to dig in for a permanently adversarial relationship.

At this point, it's not a stretch to say that the survival of the Republican Party is important for the survival of the Republic itself. Trump's version of the Republican Party, that is. There have been some excellent press secretaries in past Republican administrations, but Karoline Leavitt is the gold standard. She's providing the blueprint for anyone who follows her in future GOP administrations, especially given that the Democrats and their flying monkeys in the mainstream media will be getting more and more toxic.

While we can, though, let's enjoy watching Ms. Leavitt provide an ongoing masterclass in how to deal with the MSM cancer that's eating away at our freedoms.

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Everything Isn't Awful

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POTUS Press Today

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
02/18/26

DAILY GUIDANCE AND PRESS SCHEDULE FOR
THURSDAY, FEBRUARY 19, 2026

In-Town Pool
TV Corr & Crew: FOX
Secondary TV Corr: OAN
Photos: AP, AFP, NYT, Reuters, Getty
Print: Washington Blade
Secondary Print: The Guardian
Radio: CBS
New Media: Frontlines

Out-of-Town Travel Pool
TV Corr & Crew: FOX
Photos: AP, AFP, NYT, Reuters, Getty
Print: Washington Times
Secondary Print: Reuters
Radio: ABC
New Media: Human Events

EST:
7:40 AM Out-of-Town Travel Pool Call Time
6:00 PM In-Town Pool Call Time

9:00 AM THE PRESIDENT participates in the Board of Peace Event
Washington, D.C.
In-Town Travel Pool

THE PRESIDENT departs Washington, D.C. en route Rome, Georgia
Out-of-Town Travel Pool

1:50 PM THE PRESIDENT visits a Local Business
Rome, Georgia
Out-of-Town Travel Pool

2:30 PM THE PRESIDENT participates in a Podcast Interview
Rome, Georgia
Closed Press

3:30 PM THE PRESIDENT participates in a Local Factory Tour
Rome, Georgia
Out-of-Town Travel Pool

4:00 PM THE PRESIDENT delivers Remarks on the Economy
Rome, Georgia
Pre-Credentialed Media

THE PRESIDENT departs Rome, Georgia en route The White House

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