White House struggles with muting function for 22 minutes on Iran conference call with reporters

[beero1000]

It took the White House 22 minutes to figure out how to enable the "listening only" feature on a conference call on Thursday in which senior administration officials announced that President Trump would continue to waive nuclear program-related sanctions, keeping the deal intact.

"This White House can't even run a f*cking conference call," a reporter on an unmuted phone line angrily exclaimed to the entire call. "They don't know how to mute their line."


"It's the illegitimate media that doesn't know how to conduct themselves. They can't mute their f*cking phones," an unidentified official said. "Mute your phones."


Another White House official repeatedly attempted to quiet the noisy line "so the people in charge" could talk.


"I think if everyone had half a brain and common sense and muted their phones, this wouldn't be a problem," she yelled in an apparent fit of frustration.


"Hello? Hello?," one reporter interjected, some 15 minutes after the slated start of the call. "Has the call started?"


"This is Kim Jong Un calling for Donald Trump," another reporter joked as tensions flared.


"All participants are now in listen-only mode," the operator finally announced, much to the relief of everyone on the call. The call began at 1:07 p.m.


A State Department official announced at the end of the call that the technical difficulties prevented the senior administration officials from taking any questions from reporters.

Only the most qualified...

 

[RavenSky]

It took the White House 22 minutes to figure out how to enable the "listening only" feature on a conference call on Thursday in which senior administration officials announced that President Trump would continue to waive nuclear program-related sanctions, keeping the deal intact.

"This White House can't even run a f*cking conference call," a reporter on an unmuted phone line angrily exclaimed to the entire call. "They don't know how to mute their line."


"It's the illegitimate media that doesn't know how to conduct themselves. They can't mute their f*cking phones," an unidentified official said. "Mute your phones."


Another White House official repeatedly attempted to quiet the noisy line "so the people in charge" could talk.


"I think if everyone had half a brain and common sense and muted their phones, this wouldn't be a problem," she yelled in an apparent fit of frustration.


"Hello? Hello?," one reporter interjected, some 15 minutes after the slated start of the call. "Has the call started?"


"This is Kim Jong Un calling for Donald Trump," another reporter joked as tensions flared.


"All participants are now in listen-only mode," the operator finally announced, much to the relief of everyone on the call. The call began at 1:07 p.m.


A State Department official announced at the end of the call that the technical difficulties prevented the senior administration officials from taking any questions from reporters.

Only the most qualified...

I think the comments from these White House officials gives a lot of credence to the Fire & Fury book

 

[Jimmy Higgins]

This is a joke right? Granted, I likely wouldn't have thought of it but this Admin can use a phone, right?!


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

 

[RavenSky]

This is a joke right? Granted, I likely wouldn't have thought of it but this Admin can use a phone, right?!


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

While I'm sure Trump will insist it is fake news, it is being reported as real by multiple news sources, with CBS apparently the main source:

https://www.cbsnews.com/news/white-...ction-on-iran-conference-call-with-reporters/

https://slate.com/technology/2018/0...ouldnt-enable-the-listening-only-feature.html

http://www.newsweek.com/white-house...ng-mute-reporters-iran-conference-call-780522

Took 22 minutes to figure out how to turn it on, and then apparently they couldn't figure out how to turn it off either:

A State Department official announced at the end of the call that the technical difficulties prevented the senior administration officials from taking any questions from reporters.

Or simply used it as an excuse to dodge questions

 

[beero1000]

This is a joke right? Granted, I likely wouldn't have thought of it but this Admin can use a phone, right?!


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

A year into the term and they still can't even work the phones. They were on the call with more than 100 reporters and blamed it on the 'illegitimate media'. I just can't...

 

[RavenSky]

Rachel Maddow has the full transcript

 

[Malintent]

2 issues...

1) mastery of the conference call features is expected. Bad WH administration.

2) when joining a conference call, introduce yourself and then mute your fucking phone (or the next time I see you I will shove it up your fucking ass). Rude participants.

The likely reason they could not take questions is they did not know how to take the participants OFF of mute.

 

[Jimmy Higgins]

2 issues...

1) mastery of the conference call features is expected. Bad WH administration.

2) when joining a conference call, introduce yourself and then mute your fucking phone (or the next time I see you I will shove it up your fucking ass). Rude participants.

The likely reason they could not take questions is they did not know how to take the participants OFF of mute.

For some reason, this comes to mind.
[YOUTUBE]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HrlS9_n8GX4[/YOUTUBE]

 

[rousseau]

Somehow my last few issues of Foreign Affairs don't seem super relevant anymore..

 

[starwater]

ET call home.