New York Times reporter Maggie Haberman was the one who blew the whistle on President Donald Trump’s relationship with his aide, Natalie Harp, who was among those included in her book about the White House staff.
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Haberman said that, according to those she’s spoken to in Trump’s world, Harp “doesn’t do much outside of work. She works constantly for him.”
She explained that it’s a “huge amount of value” to Trump, who often relies on aides to make him feel better.
“I described her the other day as, as you know, a binky, for lack of a better way of putting it, a comfort blanket,” said Haberman. “There are men who have played that role for him too. One of them would be Boris Epstein, about whom, you know, his legal adviser, you know, of whom the president describes him as his psychiatrist.”
Haberman quoted Trump saying, “Sometimes you just want somebody to tell you everything is going to be okay. That is a lot of what the president values.”
CNN host Wolf Blitzer mentioned national security concerns about Harp and the clearance issues. It was reported by MS NOW’s Jake Traylor and Jacqueline Alemany, on Wednesday, that it took Harp over a year to handle her clearance paperwork. The reasons for it were unknown, but the president personally intervened on Harp’s behalf.
“So, our understanding is that she does have a security clearance. We haven’t independently corroborated that she was delayed on her SF-86 forms to get a longer-term one,” said Haberman. “She came in … with a temporary clearance, the way that most other people working in the White House did.”
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She noted that most people know that Trump speaks via a cell phone that “everybody has the number,” including world leaders.
“That includes a bunch of people. And, you know, we don’t quite know exactly how secure that phone is. I think the bigger issue that people have had about concerns is just her level of, of, you know, intense devotion to him. And that was what became a question for the Secret Service.”
She went on to mention that the White House appears to be realizing that they made things worse by “elevat[ing] attention around Natalie Harp by bushing back on Jon Ossoff and going further than what Ossoff had said about their relationship themselves.”
Ossoff mentioned that all Trump wanted to do was “build his ballroom and fly around with Natalie.” GOP apologists and MAGA allies quickly began talking about an affair and claiming Ossoff was “insinuating” something.
“But there’s also, you know, the way a president’s world functions and, you know, this who is around him, who helps provide him with information that is going to be of interest and importance in any administration,” Haberman said. “She’s a government employee. It should not be a surprise.”
CNN White House reporter Alayna Treene echoed the comments, saying that some in the White House now admit “that some of those more aggressive posts defending Harp actually had the adverse effect of drawing more attention to this relationship and dragging this story out.”
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