MONTICELLO, IOWA – Will Hillary Clinton start taking any actual questions from reporters — as well as voters — today?
So far Clinton’s nascent presidential campaign has only been serving up tiny morsels about her road trip to this tiny hamlet in the eastern portion of the Hawkeye State.
She rolled out of New York around 3pm on Sunday as her announcement video finally hit social media, seat belted into a Secret Service retro-fitted van that the candidate likes to call “Scooby” — as in the “Magical Mystery” vehicle of cartoon fame. (Metaphor alert!)
Little is known about the van itself — the fact that it has not been photographed yet has become a mini-sensation on the Internet, with folks Tweeting out their own versions of what the van might look like. Supporters sending around triumphant versions and detractors surmising their own dark versions of what emails may be shredded in the vehicle — campaign as Rorschach test.
As part of the effort to show how spontaneous this road show is supposed to be, aides have told we traveling reporters on the Clinton beat little other than that the van is a black GMC van. And yes that the candidate herself nicknamed it Scooby. (Never mind that the Republican National Committee’s Sean Spicer quickly took to Twitter to point out a book on Clinton’s 2000 Senate run said the campaign vehicle of choice was also named Scooby — hmm maybe this one is not so spontaneous).
As for the other morsels offered up to the press, they’ve mostly been about food than actual interactions with real voters — and yes no interviews along the road with reporters that might ask pesky questions about email servers and take the candidate off-message.
So we have learned that when she stopped in Pittsburgh Sunday night, Clinton ordered room service and — as luck would have it — the menu had a section labeled Scooby snacks. (Perhaps a hotel worker with a silly sense of humor).
Then of course there was Monday’s stop at a Chipotle south of Toledo. Again, we learned she had a chicken burrito bowl (with black beans and some guac). But the odd photo of surveillance video showing the candidate behind dark sunglasses showed no actual interaction with voters.
As for those recent unrelated stories on Chipolte’s high calorie count, do not despair. The campaign offered that Clinton packed some healthy snacks — almonds & cottage cheese.
The can finally made it to an undisclosed location here in Iowa on Tuesday, yet still no sign of an interview or press availability. Remember just yesterday Marco Rubio entered and did his tour of Fox’s Sean Hannity, ABC’s George Stephanopoulos and NPR’s Steve Inskeep.
And when Republican Rand Paul entered, he joined Hannity and then had the much ballyhooed interview with NBC’s Savannah Guthrie that got a little testy.
“Welcome to the NFL,” NBC’s Chuck Todd told Paul on “Meet the Press” a few days later.
Nobody has been able to say the same to Clinton since she has not yet strapped on a helmet for an interview. Her aides say they will come later, for now she will focus on voters with her first event today with students and educators at a community college.
For now, the press corps is getting tiny morsels about her snacks. But we are getting a little, well, hungry.
Ed Henry currently serves as Fox News Channel’s (FNC) chief White House correspondent. He joined the network in June 2011.
