Ben Rhodes

speaker

126 appearances 2 recordings 1 series first heard Jul 2026 last heard 15 Aug

Ben Rhodes’s voice in public audio — every appearance, attributed to the second.

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recordings per month · last 12 months

Recordings per month over the last 12 months — 2 in all, peaking in Aug 2026 with 1.

Appearances

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The Briefing with Jen Psaki · The Briefing with Jen Psaki special coverage of the White House Correspondents' Dinner · 25 Jul 2026 podcast

I just don't think we can pretend like there's not an authoritarian attack on the free press in this country. matched

And just the whole pageantry of pretending like it's kind of normal times and the press can celebrate the president and vice versa. matched

I don't know, because there'll be a subtext to everything that Donald Trump says tonight is what he's doing. matched

and subpoenaing reporters and bullying media organizations and all the rest of it. matched

I personally think he's probably more likely to attack the press, make fun of the press, exalt himself, maybe toss in that nice thing at the end. matched

But I don't know. matched

A dinner that was always a little uncomfortable to watch from afar, I think, for some people, is now just more uncomfortable, given the circumstances. matched

I do. matched

I mean, I think a couple of things have happened in the Trump years. matched

And let me just echo your points, Jen. matched

I mean, you know, you get frustrated. matched

Sometimes somebody actually would get something wrong. matched

More often than not, though, they got it right. matched

And frankly, one of the things I have realized in the Trump years is sometimes we would learn things from investigative journalism or good political journalism that we wouldn't have otherwise have known. matched

You know, it actually made us better at our jobs. matched

Sometimes, you know, they'd ferret out some fraud or some waste or something that wasn't working and get the attention of senior policymakers that way. matched

That's how fundamental a free press is. matched

It actually should make the people in government better, not just by holding them accountable, but, you know, by making them smarter. matched

I think in the Trump years, what I've seen is let's be honest, in those early months when he came out like a wrecking ball. matched

With media organizations and universities and law firms, you could feel some news organizations pull back. matched

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