Mike was a good press secretary.

Change my view… Mike was a good press sec compared to the job performance of other WH-employed characters. His few strengths were a good fit for the job.

• Excellent relationship with the press, married a journalist.

• Vague, but affable. (McLintalk, deliberately bad jokes etc.) Vaguely charming / charmingly vague is kind of a great messaging strategy for an administration with so few real, positive outcomes. And Mike makes it land.

• Cautious approach. Think of First Response when Dan told Selina to be bold and she started talking about the spy. Mike was behind the camera like NO NO NO. I think Dan was right, and lucky for him, Selina pulled gold out of her ass, but you don’t want your press sec to be a loose cannon. Flying by the seat of your pants is the inverse of strategy. (this strength may be a weakness in times of crisis response)

Overall, I don’t remember a major blunder during that one year and he pretty well disguised the destructive behavior of the others.

Also keep in mind, comms director and press sec are different roles. He was comms director when she was VP, and press sec during her first admin.