CNN’s Zeleny Confronts Sarah Sanders Over Stunning Iran Statement Typo: ‘Do You Take This Seriously?’

White House Press Secretary Sarah Sanders was able to dodge quite a few questions at Tuesday’s press briefing, but CNN’s Jeff Zeleny confronted her over an erroneous statement issued Monday night by the National Security Council appearing to reverse a longstanding U.S. position on Iran.

“The NSC says it was a clerical error,” Zeleny noted. “How does a mistake like this get made and do you believe that the White House has a credibility problem around the world with its statements like this? Do you take this seriously?”

Sanders was quick to characterize the error as “a simple typo,” despite the fact that it had implied the U.S. no longer maintained a stance it firmly adopted decades ago.

Addressing whether she felt this was serious, Sanders said, “Absolutely, which is why we immediately corrected it, but again, I think the biggest mistake is the fact that the United States ever entered into the Iran deal in the first place. That, to me, seems to be the biggest mistake in this process, not a simple typo that was immediately corrected and notified individuals as soon as we knew that it had happened.”

The apparent mistake occurred when the White House said Israeli intelligence indicated that “Iran has a robust, clandestine nuclear weapons program.” Hours later, an edit changed the statement to past tense, so that it read “had.” An NSC spokesperson told CNN, “To be clear, the United States has long known that Iran had a robust, clandestine nuclear weapons program.”

However, the White House did not release a formal correction. It instead explained why the error occurred. Asked why that there was no correction issued, Sanders, not exactly answering the question at hand in a direct way, said staff talked to journalists about it.

“We responded to every journalist inquiry that we received that we’re aware of or to the best that we could responded to each person that asked about that,” she remarked.

Watch the clip above, via CNN.

[Image via screengrab]

Follow Amy Russo on Twitter: @amymrusso

New: The Mediaite One-Sheet Newsletter
Your daily summary and analysis of what the many, many media newsletters are saying and reporting. Subscribe now!