You think you’re overwhelmed by the 2016 election? Try being a campaign embed.
It’s been a long 18 months for the embeds–on air and off air reporters–from all of the media outlets covering this memorable election cycle. TVNewser caught up with ABC News campaign embeds Candace Smith , John Santucci, Liz Kreutz, Josh Haskell, Ines DeLaCuetara and Jessica Hopper to learn more about what life on the trail: the good, the bad and the ugly.
TVNewser: What’s been the most jarring experience?
Smith: Seeing how angry this country can be. I’ve heard racial slurs, anti-Semitic epithets and more.
John Santucci
Santucci: Racing to a rally in Greensboro, SC and getting a call from my desk that Trump was doing a press conference. I floored it in my car, parked, ran through the snow with my bag soaked only to walk in covered in a mix of salty slush to hear “presser cancelled.” I also remember a night in North Carolina walking out of a rally where a sidewalk separated supporters from protesters. They cursed, boo’d, screamed – it was shocking to see and hear.
DeLaCuetara: One of the most jarring experiences for me happened just last week, when Pence’s plane skidded off the runway upon landing at New York’s La Guardia airport. Passengers aboard Trump Force 2 had been making light of rough landings for a while, but it was no joke that day. The governor quickly came to the back if the plane to check in on us. It wasn’t until we stepped outside and saw the tarmac in pieces that we realized how serious this could have been.
Candace Smith
Kreutz: On the Fourth of July in 2015, I got stranded in a tiny, remote town in northern New Hampshire when my rental car broke down. I ended up meeting a homeless man who put me in touch with a local tow truck company, who ended up finding me a tow truck driver. Needless to say, it was an odd and at times, unnerving, turn of events. But I walked away with a story to tell, and one that would only foreshadow how crazy and unpredictable every day has been since.
Haskell: The most jarring experience is realizing how consuming this assignment is and that there’s really no such thing as a day off or break from the political mayhem – or your phone. Recently, I ran out of a friend’s birthday party after being there for five minutes into an East Village dumpling shop that had wifi to send a readout and write a story. You always have to be on, ready to make calls, help your colleagues as you’re their pipeline to the campaign.
Hopper: The most jarring experience for me was the day Texas Senator Ted Cruz dropped out of the race for the GOP nomination. I had followed his campaign for 10 months and watched him dance around questions about Donald Trump. For many months, he wouldn’t attack Trump in the same way other Republican competitors did. The last day of his presidential bid, he vigorously attacked Trump. It was jarring to see and now jarring to see him campaign with Mike Pence for the Trump/Pence ticket.
TVNewser: What’s always in your bag/pocket?
Liz Kreutz
Smith: Deodorant (you never know when an outdoor Florida stop will pop up), Vaseline, painkillers. And hand sanitizer.
Santucci: Gum. Sunglasses. Purell. Excedrin, NyQuil, DayQuil, bandaids. My bag is a walking pharmacy.
DeLaCuetara: Dry shampoo has saved my life this year. A blanket scarf to keep me warm on chilly planes and buses– my fellow Rubio embeds jokingly called it a “blarf.” A granola bar, because you never know when your next meal will be. Purell!
Kreutz: Hot sauce! Kidding. (Although, it really is true that Hillary Clinton brings it with her on the road). As for me: My must-have items are much more practical. I always have my phones, laptop, chargers, a camera and snacks. I’ve eaten more Clif Bars this year than I’d like to admit.
Haskell: I always have my Gimbal in my bag which is a high-tech battery powered device that holds my iPhone. I hate the term selfie stick so I won’t call it that but it helps me shoot short videos throughout the day that may end up on our platforms or live streams.
Jessica Hopper
Hopper: In my pocket is always an iPhone, sometimes two iPhones. In a pinch, they can be what captures the video or photo you didn’t expect to get on a ropeline or with voters or a key staff member of the candidate. In my bag are chargers, my laptop, mifi and a notepad. I always keep a scarf and umbrella in my bag and sometimes stuff a coat in there too. We’ve had days where we are in four time zones and go from cold to hot weather.
TVNewser: Talk about a fun day on the trail.
Smith: During the primaries back when I still covered Jeb Bush he had just ditched his glasses and had a penchant for joking around with the press. We all made a big deal about him getting contacts. During a press avail, he called me by the name of another reporter, to later reveal that he was just making a joke about his lack of glasses. As the press avail ended, he called out, “Candace, you know I know who you are…wherever you are.” I was standing right in front of him!
Santucci: I remember being on the rope line in Myrtle Beach, SC as Trump was talking with supporters. A man who said he was a Muslim was shouting at Trump – “I’m a Muslim and I support you.” Trump turned to the press pointed to the man saying, “he’s a Muslim for Trump.” The nominee then pointed right at me “John!”, he said right to my camera making sure I had the shot. As he walked off “you see that, John!” Never a dull moment.
Ines DeLaCuetara
DeLaCuetara: Fun days on the trail have involved flying over the Grand Canyon on our way from Arizona to Nevada, stopping by small farms in Iowa, indulging in all sorts of pumpkin-flavored foods at the Circleville, OH Pumpkin Show (Pumpkin chili! Pumpkin burgers!) as the Pences admired the show’s largest pumpkins, chatting with the most passionate, knowledgeable primary voters in New Hampshire. Rolling a baseball to the front of the plane asking the candidate who he was rooting for in the World Series. Touring the Indiana state fair in a little motorcade of golf-carts.
Kreutz: This job is a lot of work, so the day-to-day can sometimes feel like a grind. But ultimately, the most fun days have been those spent exploring parts of the country I never would have expected to be. To name a few: There was the day spent in Birmingham, Alabama, where I had one of the best meals of the campaign at “Hot and Hot Fish Club.” The afternoon spent chasing Hillary Clinton around the Iowa State Fair while Donald Trump’s helicopter circled above. And the rainy night her press corps spent at the hotel in New Hampshire that inspired “The Shining” (which, yes, I’m convinced is actually haunted).
Josh Haskell
Haskell: My favorite days on the trail involve a combination of a campaign event, off-the-record stops where you get great access to the candidate interacting with voters, and possibly, if we’re lucky, a press conference on the campaign plane. We had an experience like this recently on a day trip to Florida. And the best part can actually be the night flight back to New York where everyone is done working and you get a chance to talk with the campaign in a more relaxed environment and decompress with your colleagues about the day.
Hopper: One of the most fun days on the trail was a trip to the World Series while covering Sen. Tim Kaine. Kaine is a big baseball fan. We’d been in Ohio at several stops and ended in Cleveland. As we deplaned, they told us we’d be heading to the World Series where Kaine was going to watch a bit of Game 2 with his friend, Sen. Sherrod Brown. It was one of those moments where you wake up the next morning and think, did that just happen?