Working inside the White House is not as glamorous and eventful as
some popular TV shows make it out to be, former Obama administration
staff members said at a recent panel discussion in Chicago.
“The
truth of the matter is that not every single day is incredibly
action packed in the White House,” said Elizabeth Jarvis-Shean, former
White House research director.
Although Jarvis-Shean worked on
issues she said she had a special interest in, such as the Affordable
Care Act of 2010 and repealing "Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell," about 50 percent
of her time consisted of “mundane” day-to-day assignments.
Some
of her typical tasks included editing speeches or vetting somebody
expected to stand on stage with the president, among other things, she said.
Also,
White House staffers are not as witty as the characters on “The West
Wing” TV show, said Chris Lu, former White House cabinet secretary.
“If
you’ve seen ‘The West Wing’ TV show, you know the whole thing is
walking and talking,” Lu said at the discussion, sponsored by the
University of Chicago Institute of Politics. “You can’t walk and talk
in the West Wing ... it is tiny in the White House.”
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