PR Breakdown Live with Molly McPherson

Hey there, everyone. We're just getting a late start. I have a guest coming on, and I want to make sure that he's. Oh, I had him here. Okay, good. Okay. All right, so I think I got you, Clayton. Okay, so, hey, everyone, we just had a little delay this morning because I was a horrible host and I was just really too late to the game. I. I have a. A new office set up today, so things are a little crazy. So let me. Let me just bring people on real quick. We are. We are going to follow up from the live that we had yesterday. I just hopped on substack real quick, and even my. My executive assistant, Deanne said, did you already do your live? Like, are we canceling your live? And I was like, no, I was just watching a live press conference, and I needed. I needed to get other people's take on it. So what was great, and which is one of the reasons why I love Sub Stack, is one of our members reached out, Clayton and said. Which I've. I've seen Clayton's name before, and I knew that he had a media background, and he said, I have experience doing this, so. Hey, Clayton, how are you?

I'm doing well. Molly, I hope you can hear me now.

Yeah, let me. Let me take my. Let me take my headphone out. Hold on one second. Okay, tech, Tech, Tech.

Oh, my gosh, works.

Yes, we are. Let me see if. Let me see this works.

Can you guys hear me?

Okay, Okay, I. Because my. Because the audience is so great, they'll tell me if. If we're having issues here. So.

Yeah, yeah, let us know if you can hear me, guys.

Yeah, if someone wouldn't mind.

Yes. Long time fan, long time listener, first time caller. Nice to be with you. Let us know if you can hear me, guys.

Yeah. Oh, hold on one second. Okay, wait, I got us on twice. Hold on one second. Okay, here we go. All right, now do you hear me?

Okay, I hear you fine. How about.

All right, and we. And we got everyone else. Oh, my gosh, I have a million screens going at once. Hold on. All right, I got my people here. Got my people here. Jeez, there's so much going on.

What happens when you're producer, director, host, intern, the whole bit.

Right? So, Clayton, I have your bio in front of me, but why don't you tell everyone. Tell us everyone about your background.

Yeah, So I spent 20 years at ABC News as a producer behind the scenes, and then a correspondent on the air based here in Denver, where I'm still at. And then was it Scripps News, most recently as a, As a national correspondent. And now I'm, I'm writing some in the middle of writing a Star wars book. I'm kind of a Star wars nerd. I've done a couple, as you can tell. Welcome to the Star wars, dad.

Yes, I see that. I see that.

And, and, and doing some consulting and media training for a firm here in Denver called Dovetail Solutions. And been having been transferring all of those. Those journalism skills into, into the other side of the, the fence. And, and that's been fun and interesting to learn. And so, yeah, it's. I have kind of a very mishmash of media experiences sort of on the journalism side, and now the other side, the PR side.

Okay, well, that's wonderful. So you're. You're doing media training right now?

Yeah, exactly. Yeah, yeah, a little bit. We were just working with a client last week and on a kind of a crisis case where they were filing a lawsuit against a city here. And so, yeah, we dove into that and did a bunch of media training with the gentleman that was representing the plaintiff in the case. So. Yeah.

Okay, well, good. Okay, so we are going to jump into our call right now. I'm just going to do a final check so everyone can hear both of us, and everybody's in the chat. Okay, good. All right.

Oh, good. All right, cool.

Okay, good. So I have questions. So what we're gonna do is this is just gonna be like our, Our regular chat. Clayton, have you been on just our regular Friday chats? You know the cadence and everything?

Yeah, yeah, I've seen one or two of them, sure.

Yeah, I've seen one or two. Okay.

I watched. I watched with you yesterday. I. I didn't watch the presser. I watched you watch the presser.

Oh, okay. Okay. Well, this is why. And I'm so happy that you. Because, I mean, you're like me. I mean, you have, you have long experience. So tell me, so you were at. Were you GMA or ABC News?

ABC News, which includes gma. So I did, you know, depending on the story, I was, I was on gma. I was on World News Tonight, Nightline, occasionally with. With longer feature stories. And so, yeah, kind of. Kind of ran the gamut of broadcasts.

Okay, so give me your era. Give me your era. Like who. I know Robin Roberts was.

Yeah, yeah. So I started in 2000 in Washington, D.C. you're at the D.C. bureau. There were. Yeah, so there were still some of the, Some of the greats around, like Sam Donaldson. I worked for Sam on his webcast and, and radio show that he did. Worked for. Worked for Peter a few times. He would come down to D.C. a lot and I would, I would be his producer on live broadcasts from. From time to time. Peter Jennings. Yeah.

You were there 9 11.

Yeah, I was there for 9 11. It was funny. We moved to, we moved to D.C. and all within like a year. We had the D.C. sniper story. We had 9 11. We had, you know, anthrax being delivered to the mail room.

The DC Will. I mean, we can't get too far from the press conference here. But the D.C. sniper case. So I lived in Old Town during that case and it was a Sunday and we were getting gas in Manassas.

Yeah.

And the next day the shooting took place. Kitty corner from where I was. And then the day that I had to get an ultrasound was the day someone was killed in Bethesda.

Yeah.

To live in D.C. at that time was insanity.

Yeah. Yeah. And, and you would, you would pick. Or we, I was picking gas stations based on where, you know, I thought somebody could be hiding out and avoiding those places. So. Yeah.

Well, so then here is our transition into this. So did cover press conferences from Charles Moose.

I did sort of remotely. I was a cutting producer at World News at the time, so I was, you know, I was watching them from, from, from the bureau. I don't think I attended any in person, but I did cover the trial afterwards. Down.

You did. Okay, well, you had mentioned to me that you've covered a lot of press conferences.

Yeah.

Okay, so you've been in the room. So did you see any of the clips from. I mean, there's been a number of press conferences now, but did you see any of the clips from the press conference yesterday out of Pima County?

Oh, yeah, yeah, I watched, I watched the whole thing. I went back and watched the whole thing.

You went back. Okay, well, now here's, here's the big question. What was your take? Did you, did you have the same. Overall, what was your take on the press conference overall?

It was, it was rough. It was, I think you called it a train wreck. I would, I would agree with that. I think that, you know, first of all, this is a really tough. I, I, you know, I have some empathy for the sheriff. This is a really tough position to be in. This is a high profile case. It's being covered internationally. You know, I saw stories this morning from the Daily Mail, the BBC, you know, from those guys all the way to Entertainment Tonight. I mean, they're, they're all sort of there in the room. And it is tough to do your job in at a time like that. But that being said, there were a lot of, I think, unforced errors in. In this press conference, where I do think ultimately they don't. They don't really know what's happening in this case. And. And they're flailing a little bit, but. And you saw some of that, and you saw some mixed messaging and some sort of backtracking, and like you said, they were back on their heels, I think, quite a bit. Yeah. So, yeah, I think. I think they could have come out and been much, much shorter. It was interesting as. As you. You and I were watching it yesterday. I agreed with you that, you know, you kept saying, there's no news here. There's nothing new. And. And you were right in that moment. But when you go back and look at that press conference, there actually was a lot of news that came out of it, but it was so damn disorganized.

Yes, that's exactly.

It came out in drips and drabs and piecemeal. You know, we learned about the blood on the porch, the timeline, the reward, the arrest of an imposter, the fact that there was no surveillance video, the deadlines, all of that stuff came out. And when you. When you combine that, there was, you know, there was. It was newsworthy.

It was. Okay. So let's start at the beginning, though. Let's.

Let's.

Let's be organized. Let's not be like Pima county and all over the place.

Fair enough.

This is how it happens, because you and I are hopping in hot, you know, on this. But, you know, I'm covering it live, top of mind. And I'm watching it really like the public's watching it.

Exactly.

And I'm watching it with, you know, somewhat of a different eye just because, you know, I just having the background and watching and working so many. So let's start at the beginning because I do agree with you. And doing the live chat in the beginning, listening and. Yeah, was no news.

There wasn't. You're right.

Then the news. I think I said in the live. They. They kept burying the lead because they would drip out like, well, wait a minute. That's news. So from the beginning. So, Clayton, have you been. So you've been in a press conference?

Oh, yeah.

Okay, give me an example. Give us an example of a similar press conference. If you could bring out a nugget in time, go back in time for a news story. Give us an example.

Yeah, I think. I think the most Effective ones. There was a murder case that we were covering here in Colorado, this guy named Patrick Frazee, and it was a similar sort of thing. His fiance had gone missing, and so there was a few days where nobody knew what happened to her.

Wait a minute. Is this a national story?

This was a national story.

Okay, any more background? Does anyone else know this story?

Yeah, I'll give you a little bit of background. He was.

What year?

Oh, this is probably 2019. Yeah, 2019. Patrick Frazee. Fra.

Not Patrick Swayze.

No, not Patrick Swayze. Absolutely not Patrick Swayze. Patrick Frazee was a guy who lived down in. In a. In which county? Down in Colorado. Florissant was the name of this tiny, tiny little town. But anyway, he. His. His fiance went missing, and he, you know, for days, people were looking for. For. For his fiance.

Kelsey Kelsey Barrett.

Kelsey Barrett. And, yeah, this was a. This was a. This was a big case that we covered extensively on GMA and.

Oh, oh, wait, wait, wait. I see Kelsey's photo now.

Oh, yeah, yeah.

Okay.

Absolutely. Yeah. So we were. We were covering that case, and it was an interesting one because she was missing for a few days, and. And the police were kind of doing the same thing where they were saying, we don't have a person of interest. We don't have a suspect. What was really interesting about that case for me is I was working it with a producer friend of mine named Carol McKinley, and Carol had really great local law enforcement sources, and I had really great federal law enforcement sources. So between the two of us, we had the story. We knew what it was, but this was stuff that was told to us in confidence that we couldn't report. And so we kind of knew what the backstory was. So it was really interesting to watch the police in their press conferences. Right. Sidestep all of the things that we knew were going on that they. That they couldn't talk about, but they were at least direct in what they did know and confident in presenting it. I think the problem with yesterday was that they had all this information that came out, but they didn't come right out at the beginning and confidently present all of that stuff right away. Took them 12 minutes to talk about the reward. Took them, you know, longer to talk about the timeline. That stuff should have all been up at the top, presented confidently, and then, you know, ask for help, present the timeline, ask people for help. Did you see anything or hear anything around that time, appeal to the public and. And then. And then kind of be done with it. Maybe take a few questions.

Well, let me ask you this question first off the bat. Can I ask you this question?

Absolutely.

So, you know, in the, in the Pima County Sheriff presser yesterday, so they went live, the live feed went live, I believe, right at the top of the hour. They weren't quite ready yet. But the, the pio. The public information officer was in the background. Oh, yeah, you could hear just the pitch and tone. There was stress there.

Yeah.

And you know, this going into a town that a lot of these law enforcement offices aren't necessarily set up to handle national and international press.

Right.

You could connect it back to the, The Patrick Frazee case. So you, like, you've been there. And I do want to come back to information and sourcing. But yesterday when, when they were getting the, the room all situated, it reminded me, and I had said this in the live of the press conferences around the flooding in Texas over July 4th and in the hill country, when at the Mystic Camp, you know, all those, it had the same mood in the room where it was frenetic. The press was there.

Right.

Right off the bat, I noticed right in the beginning, the sheriff comes out and lectures the press, like.

Oh, yeah, yeah.

Tell me your thoughts on that.

Yeah, I, I think that's a, I think. I think that's a sign that you are. They are. They are defensive about. About the progress of the case. I think is the, the heart of that is. Is they realize that there hasn't been much new information they haven't found. Nancy. They, they don't have a lot to go on at this point. And so taking shots at the press, I think is. Is probably. Is kind of. Kind of a desperate move. And I think, I think the sheriff, you know, is probably used to dealing with local reporters, and they all kind of have a familiarity and cadence maybe in terms of. And now he's got, you know, people, national reporters parachuting in that are. That are. Have no relationship to him, have no, you know, good point. Allegiance or anything. And so they're going to be, I think, much, much tougher and harder.

But let me ask you a question then. So right when we started, so let's say you're in a room. So you've covered a number of press conferences and when there's like a, like a breaking news story and also cases where someone's missing. So he said, right. Right off the bat, he comes up to the bank of Mike's and he says, I'd ask. So I'd ask that you just kind of be patient with me, pay attention to the questions. Asked. Because sometimes you guys want to ask the same question twice, you'll get the same answer. So you have to help yourself get what you can get out of this. And, and then he, he diverted into, like, there was a, like a, a tragedy, like an accident that.

Oh, the helicopter. Yeah, yeah.

You know, which is, which is awful. But, Clint, would you agree with me that it felt like, you know, right off the bat, like, if you're in that room and you're a member of the press, how should a spokesperson, not a pio, but like a head law enforcement. What's the first thing they should say when they come up to the bake of mites? What do you want to hear as a reporter or a producer?

I, you know, usually what they do, I mean, typically what they do is they just come up there and they, they announce who is going to be there. They'll. They'll spell the names. You know, they'll do, they'll do the basics because they know that there are people who don't know, you know, the FBI special agent in charge or how to spell the sheriff's name or pronounce it or whatever. So I think, you know, that come.

To think of it, they didn't, I don't, I didn't see them do that.

Yeah. And I, you know, that's, that's just sort of basics. But again, they mean they're probably not used to dealing with out of town press who don't know. And so they're probably assuming that everybody knows who everybody is. Maybe. But that's always, you know, that's always helpful to know who is going to be talking, especially if you have three or four officials that get up there and then, you know, kind of lay out what the, what the expectations are. We're going to, we're going to, we've got some new information we're going to give you. We're going to talk about a reward. You know, give them a little preview and then, and then kind of set expectations. Like, we're going to, we're going to ask three or four questions and then that's, that's all we have. We're going to move on and get back to work.

So when you watched it, when you watched it yesterday, so you went back, you watched it kind of live, took.

Six pages of notes.

Oh, you did? So tell me when you first saw, when you watched it again. Now, granted, you already went through my live chat, but let's say you're in the room and Sheriff Nanos walks up in the first Minute when he's talking, do you think he, how do you think he's feeling in his head that like, is he confident? Does he have information?

Yeah.

Why did, in other words, why did they call that press conference yesterday? What was the reason?

I think probably number one, a logistics one a day or two before he had done, he had talked about how his entire day was answering questions from the press and he was doing not only the press conferences, but I noticed he was doing a lot of one on one, sit down. I noticed that to some of the network people. And so I think it was partially a way to get everybody in one room for an hour or whatever and, and get all the questions addressed in one place so he's not spending so much time doing all of that stuff. But no, I don't think he was overly, overly confident. He seemed to be largely focused on process. He kept talking about lab results coming back and working with tech companies and all. You know, he kept going into all of these things that they're, they're doing and, and telling people, well, you know, the results haven't come back yet. And it's like, yeah, we know you can step on the gas a little bit to get those results in, so.

Oh, that's a really good point.

Yeah. I don't know that anybody was buying a lot of that. You know, he did fairly early on say that we have not identified a suspect or a person of interest and we could talk about Ashley Banfield and all that stuff. Well, we have.

Well, we are going to talk about Ashley.

But no, I did not get a sense in that first, you know, 15 minutes that there was anything particularly new newsworthy. Right. They call it. Yeah, I think, I think it was, yeah, I think it was.

First 15 minutes. It seemed disorganized, completely questioning. Yeah, why are we here? So, but then here's the question. I, when I was first watching, within the 15 minutes, I did see him pop up on a number of media interviews, one on one.

Oh yeah, yeah.

When you get to that point, when also you are the chief law enforcement POC or point of contact for this and you're doing media interviews, there's an optics issue, particularly with a case where they're going on so little and then the other piece of it is Ashley Banfield. So let's talk about just in the moment first before I get to the Ashley Banfield. Should they have done that press conference yesterday? Was there enough news to warrant a press conference yesterday?

Yes, I think, I think, I think simply the, the existence of the reward you know, that is. You know, that's big. That's. That's a lot of money. And you.

But tell me about the $50,000. Does that seem like.

Yeah, I think it's a good starting point. I think, you know, as. As rewards go, I think they can always. They can always kind of go up from there. But I think that really, you know, I actually. I actually talked to a former FBI. He's. He's retired from the Bureau now, but I talked to a former FBI source of mine last night then, and we were kind of kicking this around, and his. His key takeaway was not saying much outside of asking for help is really the best thing that you can do because then you do get this sense that they're sort of flailing around and.

Wait, wait, wait, wait. Are you saying your FBI's. Your. Your source said that from a. From a presser point of view, that it was good.

No, no, no, no. That it was not good. That it was not good. That they were sort of word vomiting in that press conference, and what they should have done was talk about the reward, talk about the timeline, talk about the things that they could talk about, and then kind of move on.

Okay, Clayton, I have to ask, and I know you asked this of your source. What does your source think is going on? I know you guys talked about it. I know you did.

Yeah. Yeah. I mean, the sense of it is. And. And the. The FBI guy in the press conference sort of said the same thing that. That one of my. One of my sources said, which was you would have expected to hear from someone by now if this was an actual kidnapping.

Right.

It just, you know, these things don't go on this long without. Without some sort of legitimate contact. And I know there's the. The hoaxes and the. The other. The other ransom notes that they're investigating, but, you know, this is. The sense is from. From my friend, was that this is not. This is not a kidnapping. This. This is probably. Probably a random crime and probably random. The thing, you know, well, random. Somebody unknown, like, not, you know, not in the family. Not. Not. Not in the family. He didn't think. You know, the thing about. Also the thing about Pima county is that it is. It's something like 9,000 square miles, and most of it is very rural.

Right.

Open space. Tucson's really the only major. Major city in the county. And, you know, there's a lot of. There's a lot of area to search. There's a lot of ground. Physical ground to cover. And. But yeah, the Sense is that this was not a Clayton.

I mean, this is not a crime. True crime chat. But yeah, you think, what do you think it's funny.

There's so many. I, I'm not an armchair detective, but, yeah, I, I, I tend to, I tend to think the same thing, that it's probably a crime that was, you know, may, maybe the, maybe whoever did it knew of her or, or, you know, the house is, you know, it's a nice house, nice neighborhood. Could have been some sort of financial thing. But I also think that, think that, you know, if you're kidnapping somebody, you know, you don't hurt them, you don't injure them, and that's, that's clearly what happened in this case. And so, I don't know, I hope we can't say.

I'm not going to hold you to this at all.

Well, you know, and that's, But I think that also gets to one of the reasons why, why this case has garnered so much coverage. And the other thing we can talk about is, you know, I've heard people say, well, you know, should this be the lead on the, on the, on the evening news every night? And, you know, is this just because of celebrity? And, and, you know, I can say when, when I covered missing persons cases and I covered a lot of them over the years, there were, there were constant almost discussions in the newsroom about things like missing white woman syndrome. And, you know, why are we covering this case and not talking about missing and murdered indigenous women? And, you know, these, these discussions are, are happening, and I'm sure they're happening now. And I think it's also complicated by the celebrity because NBC and Savannah Guthrie have, you know, like, like any anchor on any morning show, they are going to work to build that parasocial relationship. They want you to feel like, you know, you're part of the family. Wake up with us and have your coffee and we'll tell you what's going on in the world. And so we are invested in, in Savannah's life, and obviously internally, NBC is, is invested in this story. And so there's a lot of reasons why I think it's getting so much coverage, even though, yes, there are bigger, more existential threat.

Definitely other stories. But you want to know what's interesting about it, too? And I'm sure you share this. It's that it's involving a news personality, it's involving talent of one network.

Yes.

So what complicates it is like, so you have other networks covering a network. You have the network, NBC not only juggling and ramping up Olympic coverage where Savannah and Craig Melvin are supposed to be and now neither are going. There's a lot of money on the line there and there's a lot of background. We can't even imagine producers scrambling, yes right now what they're doing, but also a lot of people chirping in about the Epstein files, how the administration probably loves this as a head story. And in my mind, I don't know if I said this on the live yesterday or if this is my brain thinking that, you know, usually, you know, out of the administration they have disruptive moments where they flood the zone with whatever they want as a distraction. There's already a built in distraction and we're not getting much out of the, out of the White House. What do you think about that?

Well, I, I actually had this thought yesterday that you know, typically the FBI has always been historically very deferential to local authorities. Like they'll offer assistance and they've got tons of resources around the country in the world that they can help on a, on a case. But they don't generally in the past have not wanted to be seen as taking over an investigation. But with this Justice Department you never know. And obviously the dynamic is, has shifted and been tested a little bit in Minneapolis when it comes to federal authorities and local cops. And I just, and we know the President loves celebrity, right. So I actually had the thought yesterday that I could see, I could see a scenario in which the President orders the Justice Department to take over this case as a way to make news about it and maybe distract from some other thing. That is a total guess, complete hypothetical. But, but you know, in this, in this day and age I could see it happening.

Anything can happen. The only reason why I well maybe maybe on standby for that but I think because this story has, has led to so many different areas that the White House doesn't need to do that yet and they're probably enjoying it. And also the, the FBI cash Patel.

Right.

Not to bring in like Charlie Kirk but I mean they were railed, you know on the work there because things are getting done and the local, the local special agent in charge, you know, who's you know, with the FBI is there. It seems like the, the White House needs to. Wants to be standoff on this one. Just let it ride because it is picking up a lot of, it is picking up a lot of eyeballs I think people watching it. But also which is interesting to me, Gen Z I like, like I, I Would at like I have Gen Z people like my kids, friends, like reaching out, like what do you think? What do you think? And I even ask them, do you know who Savannah Guthrie is? You know, you know, and network news to them. But they're all invested. Gen Z is invested.

Yeah, yeah, you're right. And it's, it's, you know, it involves as you said, a well known TV personality in some, some regard, but also, you know, it's, it's a mystery and there's, there's some gruesome details. We don't know what happened and you know, I'm not a psychologist, but the reason I think we, we gravitate towards these stories and always have an interest in these stories is, you know, we think could this happen to us? We wonder who is capable of doing something like this. There's, there's mystery, there's danger to it, but the danger is, is distant and not, not, not a threat to us right away. And so there's sort of a natural morbid curiosity about it. And I don't think it's a modern day thing. I don't think it's a sign of society going downhill or anything like that because I thought back to like the Lindbergh baby. Right. That case, 1930 something 32 I think was, you know, went on from like March to May of that year. And then unfortunately, sadly the baby was. Baby's body was found in May, but from, from March to May that was front page news on every newspaper in the country because he was the, the child of a famous aviator and they.

Had the photo and they didn't have.

Social media back then, but yeah, it.

Was of the ladder going up. Going up the house.

Yeah, exactly. Yeah. Yeah. So, so we have, we have, you know, and ultimately until we know for sure what happened to Nancy, there is still a glimmer of hope. And I think that's what you know, also people seize on too. And one of the reasons why it continues to be so.

Yeah, so let me ask you. And part of it too, I will say maybe when I was watching and I saw, you know, the guy come out hold up the paper, you know, the white balance, it seems so throwback. You know, you don't see a lot of press conferences like this anymore. You just, you just don't. And I felt, you know, just to kind of bring it back to that press conference yesterday. I think part of it as well is that Pima county is probably getting a lot of grief and pressure.

Yes.

To, for answers and to figure this out because it is so unusual and this is long, a long term type of a case added in the hostage element of it and she needs medication and all this other, you know, this other stuff part of it. But I also feel that it was personal that the sheriff, it's getting to him as well that, you know, you, I felt, this is one of the things I said in the live yesterday that he may not have said a lot of information out of his mouth.

Yeah.

But he showed a lot of information. And I think what we really learned is that they don't have anything like. Are you feeling that?

I, I think that's true and I think that's why you're seeing so much focus on, on the process again, like here's, here's what we're doing, but we just haven't, haven't gotten anything. And I think where that, where you kind of read between the lines a little bit is, you know, when they're asked about suspects and family and they don't want to, they don't want to back themselves into a corner and say anything about that. So, so everybody's a suspect.

Right.

And when everybody's a suspect, that to me tells me that they are, they are still trying to find, trying, trying to find a thread or a lead that they can, that they get their hands on.

Follow.

Yeah.

Can I ask you from watching it, like you really genuinely. Because you just said it too, and you know this, we all know this, that law enforcement sometimes has information. They don't share information, but they'll do a press conference asking for information even though they know a narrative. But from this press conference and your sources and you just watching it.

Yeah.

You really get the feeling that they are scrambling, that they really don't have much to go on.

Yeah. Because there is, there is not a lot of information. You know, and that's, that's one thing my, my former FBI guy said yesterday. It's like there should always be things that only the cops and the bad guys know. Right.

Right.

But you know, what we do know is, is a lot of just little things that are, are, you know, don't, don't seem to, to add up to much. And you know, the more that, the longer this press conference went on yesterday and the more reporters were asking questions like there was, there was the, the one that stood out to me where somebody asked about have you checked the pharmacies to see if. Yes, those things have been filled. And, and he goes, well, we did, but maybe we need to go back and do that again.

Oh, my gosh. That was one of his low points.

That was one of his low points. And I just thought that does not instill a lot of confidence in what's going on. And then he did this one at least twice. And I think you noted this one too. But my jaw dropped open when he said he was asked, I think about motive and something else. But he said at one point, again a couple of times, your guess is as good as mine. And I went, wait a minute, no, your, your guess should be a lot better than mine. You're the ones wearing the badge. You're the guy in charge of the detectives. Your guests should be a lot better than mine. You know, even if. Never say that. Even if you think that that's the truth. Never, never, never ever say that.

He also said too, he. And he said it a few times, almost chastising himself, this self flagellation, you know, at the mic. Yeah, well, we can Monday morning quarterback and. Well, if I'm Monday morning quarterback, I would have done it differently. It's like, oh, my gosh, you are mid investigation and you're already admitting to making mistakes.

Yeah, yeah. And he said, he said mistakes are going to be made. And I just, what I thought when I, when I heard him say that was, dude, you are going to be asked that in a deposition. You know, you're going to be asked about that. What do you mean mistakes? What do you mean you would have done something differently? That, you know, it was just, at that point, it was just like the PIO needed to wrap it up.

Okay, okay, Clayton. Well, actually, let me just table that because we do have to come back to that when we wrap. Let's, let's go to the suspect part because he did say, we have not identified a suspect or a person of interest. And then later he said, everybody's still a suspect in our eyes. That's how we look at things.

Right.

So negating himself in the same press conference, we also had, and I did a post about this. We have Ashley Banfield, right. Who was formerly MSNBC and within the NBC family. And then she moved over the News Nation. And I only found out when I was watching her interview that she's a contributor now. She no longer has a show on News Nation. Yeah, she had a law enforcement source. Now you yourself in this chat are talking about having law enforcement sources. You said to her that they were looking at. Oh, here. The actor and director Timothy Buzzfield is indicted on charges that he had sexual contact with. With a child actor. Wow. Timothy Buzzfeld that's, that's going down, that's going down fast, Downhill fast.

Yeah.

Anyway, where was that? Okay, so Ashley Banfield. So when she announced that she had this source, that there are two interesting, interesting things about it. One is that it didn't get a lot of pickup. But two, I, I, I feel that what she's saying is accurate and true. It's absolutely believable. Why would a reporter not say yeah, yeah.

So I think this gets into, you know, a discussion of sourcing and I have no idea what her sources are. She's certainly an accomplished reporter. She has been at this a long time. I, and she, you know, you mentioned her career. She was actually at ABC at the same time I was for a time.

Oh really?

Only like a year or two maybe. That was before, it was right around 2010. And I'll tell you why I know that, because she came to ABC and I at that time was like the junior correspondent. I was working on the weekends and there was a shooting at the University of Alabama in Huntsville. There was a college professor that killed three people and wounded some others. And she, the female, the professor was a female, which was unusual because most mass shooters are male. And so case got a lot of attention. I flew out on like a Saturday or Sunday to cover it for the weekend shows and at the time, like I said, I was the junior guy. So they would send in the, the, the grown up correspondent to Bigfoot YAFA story on for the, for the weekday shows and they sent Ashley in and one day, it was a Sunday I think, and my, my producer Brian and I were walking into the, the campus police station for a meeting with the PIO or one of the investigators. And we were in there for 15, 20 minutes, came out and we're walking back to our car which was probably a, you know, American made SUV of some type, probably look like a cop car. But out of the corner of my eye I see Ashley Banfield running toward me in the parking lot and her producers trailing behind her. And she comes up to us and starts just peppering us with questions. I think she thought we were cops. I think she thought we had something to do with this case and was wanting to ask us questions and, and can we exchange phone numbers and all of that. And then her producer kind of caught on and realized that, that we were both there on behalf of ABC News, you know, and so we kind of had a laugh about that. But the point, the reason I tell that story is that tells you the kind of reporter that Ashley Banfield is she is not afraid to stake out a parking lot and bird dog anybody who walks in or out of a building to try and get information and try and push her reporting forward. And that sort of aggressive stance is exactly what you want in a, in a case like this. And so I have no doubt that over the years she has built up, and she actually said this the day after, I think there was a clip that they posted on News Nation where she explains, you know, I've been doing this a long time, I have a lot of sources in. And she kept saying federal, federal law enforcement. And, and she had no reason to, to doubt this person. But what I, what I also know is that whenever the FBI or the ATF or the feds get involved in a local case, obviously there's a reporting chain and they have to brief everybody up the chain. They mentioned yesterday that Cash Patel is getting briefed like several times a day, I think was the word that, that the FBI guy used. And so I think I've seen this happen before where as the information goes up the chain, it's a little bit like the game of telephone, like if you weren't in the room for the briefing or maybe you heard it secondhand. So I could see a scenario where for example, there was this report that all the cameras had been destroyed, right? And I could see a scenario where the chief or the, the sheriff yesterday said, yeah, the camera was removed from the front door. I could see a scenario where as that makes it up the chain, for example, that some federal source sitting in Washington D.C. who has no real connection to the case other than they've been briefed on it describes that as, oh, all the cameras were destroyed, right? I don't know. I don't know. I do not know what, what happened, what happened in, in that, in that particular case. But yeah, so I think and, and things change as things evolve. Like maybe there was a tip that came in about the brother in law that they felt they needed. You know, they're chasing everything, right? They're, they're having to run. The FBI calls it running everything to ground. They're, every tip that comes in, they got to run it to ground and make sure that it, that it doesn't go anywhere. And that could be what, what happened in the, in the case of the brother in law. I will say that to its credit at ABC News, I would not have been able to go on the air with a single source naming somebody as a suspect or person of interest.

Was she saying it was a single source? Because she was Right. She was saying my source, she said my source.

And in the, in the video that, that they posted on, on News Nation, she, she said sing. She kept talking about a singular source.

So what does that mean to you? And, and, and also I, I believe that it matters. She's not reporting for NBC. She's not reporting for network.

Right.

News Nation is a different network, a different level. Like I've seen them gone go with scoops before that no one picks up. Right. I think they're like the, the little kid, the little brother that nobody pays attention to.

Yeah, I, I think that's partially that.

And, but I also think it was accurate. She wasn't saying that her source said the brother in law was guilty.

Right.

She was just saying that they were looking.

They were looking. And, and that, that makes sense because in any, any case like this, that's what my friend, my FBI guy said last night, is that they're going to be questioning everybody, family members, they're going to be canvassing the neighborhood, they're going to be going to door to door. They're, they're going to talk to everybody. And like the sheriff said yesterday, we're talking to the Uber driver, we're talking to the gardener or talking to, you know, everybody is still a suspect, but we have no, no, no prime suspect. And he also had an interesting phrase which was we are not there yet. Which could be, you know, maybe we have somebody in mind, but we just haven't been able to put the, to prove it or put the, to put the probable cause together to go in. But yeah, so.

Well now when, so in that room, going back to that press conference yesterday, I, I felt, you know, the, they, I, I thought I heard the, the pio say or he said, we're only taking one question or two questions. And then they let it, you know, go on and on. But I felt the reporters were doing a better job investigating. Then it appeared the investigation out of Pima county was, it's in, in other words. And you tell me because this is your point of view.

Yeah.

I felt like they kind of had him that he was so loose up there.

Yeah.

So unorganized and distracted that they could push questions and volume questions back and forth to get him to say something.

I agree.

Yeah.

I got the sense that, that probably in that room when, when he keeps talking and he keeps answering questions, it's like, okay, this guy's not going anywhere. He's, he's clearly, you know, here for a bit and let's, let's get in Every question on the investigative part. Yeah, I, I think that one thing that maybe people understand about, you know, what happens in high profile cases like this, especially at the top networks like ABC and NBC especially and probably CBS too. But entire editorial teams are assigned to work this case. So there are editorial producers who are making calls, following up on things. You know, it is like an investigation. Like it really is. You know, they're chasing all kinds of leads as well and they are hiring booking producers to go knock on doors and, and they're doing all of, they're doing all of these things. So it really is, there is almost like this, this parallel investigation. I, I, I've often said that we are, you know, reporters, journalists are not first responders, but we are like second responders and we have a lot in common with, with, with detectives on a lot of days.

And do you get the sense that a lot of the networks and a lot of the outlets are, are putting bigger teams, like editorial teams out there, like a number of producers? Yes.

Yeah. Yeah, I think, I think everybody, I think it's all hands on deck in terms of like the, the editorial and the bookers and the, the producers on the ground. Yeah, okay.

Yeah, go ahead, go ahead.

No, I was gonna say. And, and you, you, you mentioned this briefly about the, the, the bit about the, the brother in law not being picked up by other outlets. And that is, that is, that is very telling if, if you can't match it, given all of the law enforcement sources that, that an ABC would have or an NBC would have. I do think that is, I do think that is, is telling because they've had time now and, and they are talking to their sources all the time. And you know, one thing that I used to do and it worked most of the time is that I would talk to a source or a PIO who couldn't talk about a case, the details of a case because it was an active investigation. But I would say, look, or if something came out, if somebody broke a bit of news, I would go to them and say, look, the last thing we want to do is repeat something that's not correct. So if I were to say, you know, like for, you know, so and so reported there was a bloody clown mask under the bed, like if I say that, am I going to be wrong? You know, and then, and usually there would be an off the record guidance kind of conversation about, yeah, don't say that. That's, you know, don't, you would be wrong if you said that without giving away too many other Details. So I think conversations like that were probably happening. And that is why more I, I think that's why. My guess is that these other networks and journalists were kind of waved off that report. Again, not to say that it wasn't correct at some point or elements of it weren't correct at some point, but.

A question though.

Yeah.

Is it possible? Because I think I saw when Ashley Banfield was doing an interview with Megyn Kelly, and it's the only reason why I would sit through an interview with Megyn Kelly, frankly. But she had said, I have someone closing the investigation. And it, to me alluding that perhaps it was someone in the sheriff's office and maybe he was trying to. It made me wonder.

Like a trial balloon.

Exactly.

Yeah.

Could it be a leak or could it be containing that? Could it be containing that? So, you know, you're sitting in that room too. I think there's a takeaway. Like you said, you do media training now. I do media training training. I'm a big person, especially in the middle of a crisis. Like, I like showing emotion, especially if you're at the center of something, even if you are in law enforcement, you don't have to. You can show emotion for a family and, and it can be very heartfelt. But to me, from, for me, watching felt like Sheriff Nanios, instead of being more emotive, he seemed more rattled by everything. So if you're there in that room or correspondent, are you trusting this person that they're running the investigation well, or is he, is he scrambling back on the heels?

As I said, I think he's scrambling back on, on his heels. And you know what, what happens is in the absence of, of clarity and, and hard information that they present in a, in a confident manner. You know, this is 2026. There are so many armchair detectives out there and stories and conspiracies take hold and you, you lose the narrative at that point. And I think that I, I think that that's kind of what's happening to him a little bit. He, he is better in the one on ones when he's not facing a room full of lights.

I noticed that. Yeah. And I think his pio's prepping him. Like, I think he goes in there with talking points. But when you put someone in front of a mic, I'm sure you know this.

Yeah.

Sit down and interview someone. It's. It will actually be an interviewed. I could say this too, having done network interviews.

Yeah.

Very different when it's one on one.

Yeah.

When you're doing a Press conference. There are a lot, and it's not easy. We got to give the guy credit here. It's not easy. But comparatively, he's standing there next to a special agent in charge.

Yep.

In Tucson. And. And the two. It's very noticeable.

Very, very different.

Very, very different. Let me just ask you personal opinion, too.

You.

In our couple. In our last couple minutes, they. They released the video. The family.

Yes. Yes.

Video. And then the brother, Cameron, Savannah Gusri's brother, releases another one.

Yeah.

What's going on there? Do you have any sense?

My. My sense is the. I have no information other than an educated guess, which was that we. We did learn. And this was another thing that I was surprised. They put out in the press conference. The timing of the ransom note, which was a little confusing to me because it was like, okay, the deadline's 5pm today, but then, like, it moves to Monday.

Like, that was very confusing.

You know, the. The terms change. Like, explain why. You know, either explain why there's two deadlines or don't talk about it at all.

Did you see. And did you notice when they were doing that, that FBI agent, he went back and he kept in to look.

Oh, he had to look at his notes and all that. Yeah.

Didn't even want it to come out.

Yeah. So. So that was. That was a surprise. But I think, you know, what I. What I've read and what I've seen is that. That. That second family video from Savannah's brother came out right at 5pm yesterday, right at the deadline.

So I didn't make that connection.

Let's. Yeah, so maybe, like, let's put something out right at the deadline. So if there is a kidnapper out there, maybe they're. They're paying attention and see this. This note. But, you know, again, there was no. And this is. This is unusual. Is that there was no way to contact a supposed kidnapper. So how are you. You know, how are you supposed to make this. Make this.

Okay, so let me just go in the chat. Who's. Who's paying attention to this? I did not. I did not make that connection that the brothers video came out at the timeline. And. And I assume we're saying here, Harvey, that could be Harvey Levin, because Harvey Levin, I guess, has the ransom note, too. And also, the FBA agent charge said the same thing.

Yeah, exactly.

Deadlines.

This was the public. This was the. The note that went to the news organizations.

What do you make of a ransom note having two deadlines?

Well, you know, one of the things that I'd Read is that. That there was, like, the stakes apparently are higher with the. The second deadline. Like, if you. If you don't respond by Friday, then, you know this is going to get worse. Or, you know, maybe there was a threat contained in there. I. I don't know. But there was some indication that I've read where that. That there's. That the second note. The second deadline was supposed to be more consequential for. For whatever reason.

With that, though, do you think the family believes the. Did you talk about this with your source? Do you think the family believes that she is being held?

We didn't. We didn't talk about that specifically, but I think that. I think they're just. I believe they're just pursuing all options and that the family, you know, could. Could absolutely believe it. I mean, you. You watch the video and the emotion and everything is real, and they seem to be, you know, talking to. To someone like they're a real. Like they're a real person. That the whole. The whole video is very interesting and, and why they did it and. And what involvement.

Did you see the connection where some people were talking about Silence of the Lambs?

No. What was that?

Oh, you didn't see that? Well, that some of the language in it, in the setting was very similar to the same video. Now, I didn't even look this up. I'm only doing this for my brain. But I think it was the mother who was this. The mother was a senator, maybe, and the daughter was kidnapped. Yeah, people are noticing that there's similarities there.

Oh, okay. Yeah. No, I missed that. Gosh.

Oh, boy. Come on, Clay. No, I, I didn't even look at. I only saw. I only saw it on social media that people were talking about it.

But, but can I talk. The messaging in that video, I thought. Because when it was first released, I. I texted a friend of mine, an ex CNN correspondent, and I. And I said, wow, this is right out of the FBI playbook. And there was this sort of questioning about how much the FBI was involved in the press conference. And I noticed that the FBI guy kept saying, well, this is the family's decision to put this video out. This is up to the family to deal with ransom. And I just. I thought that was a little odd to say. And the more I, the more I thought about it, I. I think it's. I think it's a PR move because I think what the FBI is trying to do is, is distance themselves from, you know, any, Any. Any notion that they wrote that statement or that they. That they were involved in crafting it, although I am sure that they were, because it had, if you notice, the message had like some. Some boilerplate stuff. And then like in the middle, all of a sudden they would. They would introduce and really try to humanize Nancy and put their own personal family perspectives and thoughts and emotion into it. But that whole. The statement was not consistent. There was language in there that I believe the FBI gave them to help humanize the whole thing. And so I kind of think the FBI wants to step back from that and let the family kind of lead on that. Let the family. The family story, the family's emotion lead on that.

But also, as you mentioned, the PR of it. It's when this. Because this case has so many eyes on it and it is so high profile, all the mistakes are going to be out there as well. And people are going to have to watch Savannah Guthrie on the air for the next how many years. Like it will always be that reminder. So someone in the chat had mentioned the line, the Silence of the Lamb line that is being pulled verbatim is talk to her. And you'll see that that's was spoken by Hannibal Lecter in Silence of the Lambs when speaking to Clarice Starling in the movie. So.

Oh, geez. Okay.

I mean, I don't know. I. I don't. I. I don't know, like, who is helping? Wouldn't it be horrible if someone were helping the guts 3 family and they're googling movies where they had ransom notes?

Yeah. Oh, that's. Yeah, that would be an unfortunate.

I don't think. Yeah, the FBI is doing that. Yeah. So it's like the FBI's in it, but they're. They're not in it. So Clayton, just.

Yeah.

To wrap this up then, if you just from a network point of view, you know, from a network point of view, network news point of view, that press, that press conference yesterday. Net positive, net negative, net neutral.

Well, net positive, I think, for the networks because when you do filter out all of the. All of the nothingness that was there, there was. There was news and, and that. That allowed them to. To keep. To keep leading with the story and defeat the beast.

Now they had new information too, but.

But yeah, on the, on the sheriff's side, I think it was probably a net negative. And, you know, hopefully. Hopefully they learn from it too, and that they're sort of having the same conversations we are about the difference between his demeanor with. With, you know, compared to the FBI person and, you know, not not being able to have much information. And you know, also what, what really goes a long way, you would think, like all these cynical reporters would not be swayed by this. But if you come out as a public official and you, you say, you know, somebody asks you a question that you can't answer, it's like, yeah, we, we understand why that is an important question. We want that answer, too. We are working hard to find it. You know, your demeanor and, and, you know, trying to, trying to at least act like you're seeing things from the perspective of the press, I think goes a long way. It humanizes you a little bit. And, you know, being, being a little more transparent about what you don't know and what you really need is, is I think does go a long way to kind of getting the public sentiment on your side. But like I said, hopefully they'll learn a little bit from that and try and apply it.

Yeah. Well, Clayton, I want to thank you for joining me today for our weekly chat. There will be a conclusion to this.

There will be. Yeah, there will be.

I, I, I don't know how it could be.

Yeah.

Positive. It's heartbreaking.

It is, it's heartbreaking. It's, it's, it's stomach churning. It's, you know, to, to have to go through this as a family member and not only that, but go through it so publicly.

Right.

In the age of the Internet and like I said, with all these, the armchair detectives and social media and it's, it's got to be the worst thing in the world. But like you said. Yeah, there will be, there will be a resolution to it at some point.

Yeah. And I would love to have you back, too. And then we could even, Yeah, I would love to.

That'd be great.

And then even see and watch how NBC, because NBC is, is NBC is juggling. I can't think of another time where it's one thing, if you're dealing with a crisis like you're dealing with like a Matt Lauer crisis, that's different. This is a, this is a tragedy.

Yeah.

Acting someone. And it's going to be so ongoing. And right now they, so they brought Hoda back, Hoda Copy back, you know, kind of fill in and spot in, but they have to be shiny, happy morning television show, while talent is just dealing with this tragedy.

Yeah, it's the worst. And the Olympics, it goes against every, you know, mood that you try to create on, on a, on a network morning show like that. But, you know, I think there's sort of an appropriate tone to strike. And I think for the most part, they. They are striking it. It's got to be awkward. I texted an NBC correspondent who's out there now and just said, it's got to be hard to report on your own people like this. And I didn't really get an answer. I just kind of got a thumbs up.

Oh, yeah.

So, you know, I know. I know that it's. It's. It's rough when it's. When it's one of your own and. And awkward, you know?

Yeah, it's hard. Well, Clayton, thank you so much for joining me.

Yeah, I'd love to be back. I had all these notes on. On Baldoni and.

And lively where the conversation goes, especially when we have our chat too, because so many people are talking about it and like, we're looking at it from a media point of view. That's what fascinates me. I'm trying to glean information. Yeah, that. But there's a lot of true crime people out there who are really good at this and. And reporters as well. So, Clayton, thank you so much for the time. Keep watching the story, though. Keep talking to your sources.

Will do. Yeah, yeah, we'll have you back and. And take another deep dive on this. It'd be great.

Absolutely. Okay, well, thanks. We'll talk again. All right, thanks so much.

See you later.

Alrighty. Bye. Bye, everyone. Thanks for joining me. Bye for now.