White Sauce: Sky News host Paul Murray scores photo with Trump
This week’s The Sauce covers Scott Morrison’s State visit to the US: What did officials beg press gallery journos to stop doing on Shark One, and why were two hacks singled out for special attention on the trip?
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The much-anticipated Oval Office meeting lived up to its hype as President Donald Trump and Prime Minister Scott Morrison held court with the media for more than 30 minutes.
And for one hack the experience proved even more special because he scored a rare power-pic in the White House.
Sky News host Paul Murray travelled to Washington to help anchor the coverage with fellow presenter Laura Jayes.
But at the end of the somewhat chaotic execution of what the American media calls a “pool spray” — which we’d probably be more comfortable describing as a pooled pic opportunity, during which the world leaders spoke about many serious issues such as Iran, intelligence failures and China — Mr Morrison called Murray over to meet Mr Trump.
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Murray shook hands with the First Lady and President and then, somehow, your correspondent was roped in as official photographer for a happy snap.
Murray suggested a “thumbs up” picture, because “everyone loves those things”.
Hours later, Murray scored a much-sought-after solo interview with the President.
MILE HIGH WI-FI CLUB
Once upon a time, the press pack travelling overseas with Prime Ministers used the long-haul plane trips to drink, smoke (ah, the old days), sing, occasionally fight and, most importantly, talk off-the-record with the PM and senior staffers who normally are difficult to get hold of.
But on Shark One — as the Royal Australian Air Force’s Airbus A330 has been renamed under Scott Morrison — Wi-Fi is all part of the service.
The whole point is to allow the Prime Minster to stay in constant communication with Canberra in case any matter may need his urgent attention. But apparently today’s press gallery hacks are more interested in streaming video content than singalongs or getting drunk — so much so that the Wi-Fi system fmedia completely crashed halfway through the first leg of the flight to Washington DC.
The reptiles of the press used more than half of Shark One’s monthly data allowance from Canberra to Honolulu, leading officials to plead with them to lay off the streaming just a little bit for the second leg to the United States east coast.
DO YOU KNOW THIS GUY?
How good’s the ABC? At a White House press conference, some carefully chosen members of the US and Australian state visit packs got their chance to ask the leaders a question in the East Room.
As ABC political editor Andrew Probyn rose to ask a question, there was a little delay getting him the microphone. Amid the silence and as quick as a flash, Donald Trump turned to Scott Morrison and said, “I assume Andrew is a nice person?”
Cue laughter from the room, which included many of the high powered delegation involved in bilateral talks. ScoMo laughed a split second later.
The playful Probyn, relishing the floor, retorted: “Thank you Mr President, the best”, to much approval before he thanked Mr Trump for hosting the Australians and got on to a question about China.
