In an appearance on CNN's "New Day," on Monday morning, Axios reporter Jonathan Swan revealed that the Donald Trump's White House was "rattled" by revelations contained in former national security advisor John Bolton's upcoming book -- and that they appeared to be unaware of them until they read them in the New York Times.
Speaking with hosts Alisyn Camerota, and John Berman, Swan was asked how the White House was responding to the bombshell revelations that blow a huge hole in Trump's impeachment defense.
"The New York Times knew about the content of the Bolton book before you say the press shop at the White House did. What itself is the significance there?" host Berman asked.
"The significance there is it helps explain why this rattled the White House so much when the New York Times approached them for comment yesterday," Swan explained. "The White House press and communications shop -- the people who are charged with crafting a narrative, responding, getting out in front of damaging stories -- didn't know of the existence of this manuscript, let alone the details."
"So now you have Michael Schmidt of the New York Times found out about the manuscript, the relevant details of the manuscript, which contradict the central claim of the Trump defense that he never explicitly tied the holdup of aid to investigations of his potential political rival Joe Biden and the people who are charged with responding this find out from the New York Times," he continued. "So it sort of shows a number of thing: the lack of coordination inside, but also just the way this is moving and the fact that this story more than any other story during impeachment actually has the potential to change the dynamics on Capitol Hill."
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