When President Bill Clinton joined Charlie Rose for an interview Monday night, he made one of the most incisive statements of the race between his wife and Donald Trump:
It would be refreshing if there was one thing in life where he disclosed more than she has, but there isn't, not even one.
President Clinton was referring to Trump's foundation, his tax returns, and his health records—the type of inquiries the media has been ferociously leveling at Hillary Clinton for months. But Trump's transparency. Meh. Only one reporter seems the least bit interested in it. The last couple days, the New York Times has plastered its front page with stories about Clinton's health and obsessed over her failure to invite pool reporters in for a closer look at her illness Sunday. But did we see anything about Trump's lack of a pool? Nope. We didn't hear a single thing about it until Bloomberg's Kevin Cirilli said this on MSNBC Tuesday afternoon:
There was no pool reporters for the Trump campaign at all for Sunday's service, which I think has been lost in this, to be honest.
It reminded me of this revelation from New York Times reporter Maggie Haberman as she live blogged Trump's fiery anti-immigrant rant of a speech in Phoenix, Arizona, a couple weeks ago. Trump had cut out reporters earlier that day during his seat-of-the-pants trip to meet with Mexican President Enrique Peña Nieto. Here’s Haberman:
Trump has been the most restrictive general election nominee in terms of media access and information that I’ve ever covered, by dint of the media “blacklist” and, just today, leaving behind his traveling press corps on his first trip as the G.O.P. nominee.
Wow. That’s pretty much the best-kept secret of the campaign, thanks to the media.