Jen Psaki Says Biden Press Team Left With ‘Crappy Options’ — Don’t Say Much Or ‘Piss Off’ Justice Department

Former White House Press Secretary and current MSNBC host-in-waiting Jen Psaki said President Joe Biden’s press shop has been presented with “crappy options” for dealing with the classified documents case that unfolded this week.

Psaki was a guest this week on MSNBC’s Morning Joe, and she took viewers inside the beleaguered White House press shop that has been getting bombarded anew with every development, and said the tight-lipped strategy is a function of trying “not to anger” DOJ:

MIKA BRZEZINSKI: Question for you, especially since you worked in this administration, if we can put up that sort of tick tock of the days in which information came out. I guess my question is, what would you struggle with as press secretary going to the podium with this story? Would it have been better to say something when the documents were initially discovered, or shortly thereafter, saying that there’s going to be a sweeping review of all documents to make sure there aren’t any others? And would the press secretary be in the room to advise the president to make such a decision?

JEN PSAKI: Sure. I mean, Mika, in moments like this, what we’ve seen transpire over this week, you’re basically picking in a White House between crappy options. Right? And that is what they’ve been doing presumably for the last few months.

So on one hand, to your point, it would make the press secretary job much easier every day if they could go out and just say, here’s what we bet happened. This was sloppy staff work. These documents went in there inadvertently. They sort of said that, you know, from that from Sauber.

But, you know, this, Biden didn’t even know about any of these documents. So this is a non-issue. What, that would make it easier for the press secretary.

The worry they have there, Mika. And they are very not just influenced by the lawyers, the lawyers in the White House in a case like this, make a lot of the decisions or have a very loud voice in the decision making, which can be hard from the communications side.

And the lawyers are probably saying to them in a moment like this, if you make assertions like that and even anything is wrong, that could be a problem. Right? Or we’re also going to make a, piss off the Justice Department. We don’t want to do that. So that’s one you know, that would be an easier way for the press office.

What they’ve clearly decided to do is to not say much. Right? They’ve said a minimal amount because they’re trying to not anger the Justice Department. But those options are crappy, right? Neither of them are great, and neither of them make for an easy and smooth communications strategy.

Watch above via MSNBC’s Morning Joe.