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Ari Fleischer Tells 'E&P' He Spoke to Gannon/Guckert's Boss
By Joe Strupp
Editor and Publisher

NEW YORK Former White House Press Secretary Ari Fleischer was so concerned about Talon News reporter James Guckert's potential ties to the Republican Party that he stopped calling on him at press briefings for about a week in 2003, Fleischer told E&P today.

"I found out that he worked for a GOP site, and I didn't think it was my place to call on him because he worked for something that was related to the party," Fleischer said in a phone interview. "He had the editor call me and made the case that they were not related to the Republican Party. He said they used the GOP name for marketing purposes only."

He said he resumed calling on Guckert, who used the alias Jeff Gannon, after Bobby Eberle, owner of both GOPUSA and Talon News, "assured me that they were not part of the Republican Party." Eberle is a Texas Republican activist and served as a delegate to the 2000 Republican National Convention.

Fleischer has not previously commented on the Gannon/Guckert affair.

"I don't think that party organizations should have people in that room acting as reporters," Fleischer said, explaining his initial concerns. "They are advocates, not reporters, and a line should be drawn." But, after speaking with Eberle and looking at Talon News, he was convinced that GOPUSA.com and Talon News were not official party sites.

"It looked like a conservative news organization," Fleischer said. "If I thought that they were part of the party, I would not have [resumed] calling on them..."

...Fleischer said he knew that he would get a conservative question from Guckert whenever he called on him. "He was one of the few identifiable conservatives in the room," Fleischer said. "[With] some reporters, you know you will get a question from right field, and [with] some you know you will get a question from left field. I made a deliberate practice to call on everyone in the room...

...Fleischer stressed that he did not go to Guckert more often than others or in the hopes of getting a "softball" or partisan question...

...Even Guckert's ties to several sex Web sites and allegations that he worked as a male prostitute should not necessarily keep him or any other reporter out, Fleischer said. "The last thing our nation needs is for anyone in the White House to concern themselves with the private lives of reporters," he said. "What right does the White House have to decide who gets to be a reporter based on private lives?"

If allegations that Guckert ran Web ads offering his services as a male escort prove true, however, this would represent more than a "private life" issue. Asked what he thought about the recent revelations about Guckert's past, Fleischer said only, "It is all a bit odd."

Bold type added by me.