State Department spokesperson Matthew Miller momentarily interrupted a press briefing Thursday afternoon when he noticed a cockroach crawling on the wall near a reporter’s head.
“I hate to interrupt, there’s a big cockroach on the wall, over your head there. We’ll defer that — no insecticide, no roach-icide in the briefing, Matt,” Miller said, appearing to address a reporter in the room.
Miller was answering a reporter’s question when he saw the insect crawling on the wall. A voice off-screen said they would “go get it” as soon as Miller finished speaking.
“Sorry to be distracted, but that’s a rather large one,” Miller added, laughing.
Miller soon returned to answering the question, after remarking he should not have mentioned the cockroach.
“Now the room’s going to have a hard time focusing on the very important messages I have to deliver,” Miller said.
The cockroach appeared to have been dealt with soon after the interruption.
A little more than a minute later, a slapping sound could be heard off-screen, followed by clapping, before Miller said, “solves that problem.”
The cockroach’s appearance comes nearly five years after a similar incident, in which a mouse fell from the White House press briefing room ceiling and onto a correspondent’s lap, sending reporters into a panic.
Reporters present during the 2019 excitement posted live updates to the social platform X, then Twitter, after witnessing the mouse fall and later run into the office area.