White House Denies Bush’s Dim View of Brokaw

A couple of hours after this week’s Newsweek hit the stands, Tom Brokaw got a call from the White House denying the magazine’s report that of the three top network anchors, President Bush is least impressed by the NBC News heavyweight.

Brokaw confirmed that White House Chief of Staff John H. Sununu was on the phone by 9:15 a.m. Monday saying the “Periscope” item was “not true, that he had talked to the President about the item and that he, Sununu, was ‘off the wall’ ” over the thrust of the report.

Sources say Sununu had first contacted President Bush, who was en route to Cincinnati aboard Air Force One Monday morning, to confirm that the item was untrue.

In the column, “one White House insider” ticked off a series of presidential likes and dislikes in the media these days. In the world of network television, “ABC World News Tonight With Peter Jennings” led the presidential tube watching in the evening “because it is most popular with the public” and because his tennis buddy, Brit Hume, covers the White House for that network.

The report also said “CBS Evening News” anchor Dan Rather, despite his famous shouting matching with Bush during the 1988 campaign, “is not as unpopular with the President as viewers might think.

“It is actually NBC’s Tom Brokaw who impresses him least,” the “insider” told Newsweek.

Brokaw said he hadn’t seen the Newsweek piece when Sununu called. NBC reporters accompanying the President in the past two days on trips to Atlanta and Indianapolis were mystified by the swipe at Brokaw, particularly in light of the recent one-hour valentine, “A Day in the Life of the White House,” that aired on the network with the full cooperation of President and Barbara Bush.

Sources say Brokaw called Newsweek to grumble about the item and was told that “Periscope” page editor Jonathan Alter stood by his source.