Sunday on ABC’s “This Week,” former Obama administration White House communications director Jen Psaki said Democrats remained seated during President Donald Trump’s State of the Union address because they felt “a real dissatisfaction and unhappiness and anger” with the president.
Partial transcript as follows:
STEPHANOPOULOS: During the State of the Union we saw Republicans applauding and Democrats on their hands basically, basically for the entire speech, was that a mistake for Democrats?
PSAKI: No. I think Democrats look at it — there are some who didn’t attend. What didn’t happen is nobody was shouting at the president. Nobody was screaming you lie at the president. Democrats feel as many people in the country do a real dissatisfaction and unhappiness and anger. They didn’t feel they could justify this divisive rhetoric about immigration, trying to say ‘I’m for African Americans’ or trying to say ‘I’m not racist,’ when we know the reality. They were thinking of their constituents I don’t think they have had a repercussion about it and I don’t think they will.
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