Anna Bowers has an unbelievable Lawfare piece about her text exchanges with dubiously appointed EDVa US Attorney Lindsey Halligan. Halligan initiated contact with Bowers out of the blue to complain about Halligan retweeting a NYT story on the Letitia James indictment and then to retroactively take the exchange off the record.
The exchange captures what I hate about exchanges between reporters and public officials, especially attorneys–it never gets beyond conclusions, whining, and insults. Halligan repeatedly tells Bowers her reporting is inaccurate but never (despite Bower’s repeated requests) explains why. When Halligan requests details–more than conclusions–Halligan insults her and her reporting with more unsupported conclusions (you’re biased, you’ll be completely discredited, you don’t report fairly). Bowers pushed back and demanded more detail rather than letting the conclusions stand; that pushed Halligan to more whining and insults, before making a demand that no reporter would grant and that no competent public official would make.
Halligan’s conclusory responses–conclude, repeat talking points, insult–resemble what we hear from Trump and other government people every day. Bowers’s pushback distinguishes this from every news conference and talk-show interview, exposing the vacuousness of the conversation.