Olivia Troye Tells Jake Tapper Trump White House Officials Would ‘Roll Their Eyes’ When Fauci Was Briefing

Olivia Troye, the former homeland security and counterterrorism advisor to Vice President Mike Pence and aide to the White House Coronavirus Task Force, told CNN’s Jake Tapper that despite repeatedly briefing President Donald Trump on the dangers of the coronavirus, he dismissed those warnings and his senior White House officials would “look away and roll their eyes” when Dr. Anthony Fauci was giving briefings.

Troye was one of several former White House officials appearing on a CNN special program, The Insiders, describing what she witnessed while a member of the Trump administration and warning of the dangers of a second Trump term.

Tapper brought up Trump’s string of crowded, mostly maskless campaign rallies, and asked Troye if she thought Trump realized the risk of these rallies.

“I don’t know how he doesn’t realize that. He has been briefed on how contagious the virus is,” she replied, noting that experts on his task force like Fauci and Dr. Deborah Birx had told him “every day” that “this virus is very contagious and it spreads very easily and it spreads especially in mass gatherings.”

However, “he still continues to behave this way,” said Troye.

Tapper asked Troye about Trump’s efforts to “undermine,” “sideline and attempt to discredit” Fauci.

Troye described how Fauci attended every task force meeting she was in, and was frequently giving briefings, but he faced disrespect and strong push back from senior White House officials.

“I saw people in the room during the meetings, people, senior White House officials, look away and roll their eyes while he was briefing sometimes, or they would try to push back and say, well, can’t you spin the data this way?”

These officials, Troye explained, “are people who do not have any medical or scientific backgrounds,” and yet they worked to undermine him, criticizing him when he spoke publicly, and attempting to “manipulate the press briefings.”

Troye spoke of her own role, admitting she was “complicit” in these efforts while she was at the White House. “I was the person that would have to call him at times when he was on his way and say, ‘Dr. Fauci, you’re not needed today, I’m sorry.'”

“Because they didn’t want him at White House delivering facts, delivering truth?” Tapper asked.

“Correct,” said Troye, noting that other doctors like Birx and CDC Director Dr. Robert Redfield were treated the same way, told the White House did not want them briefing because they had posted a slide or said something “that just didn’t fit with the narrative that this pandemic was going away and it was not as severe as it really was.”

Watch the video above, via CNN.