Former White House press secretary Stephanie Grisham on Thursday said she and a group of officials who worked in the Trump administration are meeting next week to “try and stop” former President Trump.
“I can say that next week a group of former Trump staff are going to come together, administration officials, are going to come together and we’re going to talk about how we can formally do some things to try and stop him and also, you know, the extremism, that kind of violence and rhetoric that has been talked about and continues to divide our country,” Grisham told CNN in an interview.
She said she is “really excited” to gather with the former Trump officials and “do some great things.” The meeting will take place both in person and on Zoom.
Former Department of Homeland Security chief of staff Miles Taylor, former national security official Olivia Troye and one-time White House communications director Anthony Scaramucci are reportedly involved with the venture, three people familiar with the matter told Politico.
Taylor was the anonymous official who penned a New York Times op-ed and a subsequent book criticizing Trump’s character, and Troye, who worked as an adviser to former Vice President Pence, has been critical of Trump. Scaramucci served as communications director for just a few days before being removed from the post.
Grisham — who also served as former first lady Melania Trump’s communications director and chief of staff while working in the administration — refused to say which officials are planning to join the meeting, but did reveal there will be “about 15” in attendance, some of whom worked in the White House.
She noted that some expected attendees were ranked higher than her and others lower.
Trump remains a central figure in the GOP, and many expect him to mount a 2024 White House bid.
News of the upcoming meeting comes one day after Grisham sat with the House select committee investigating the Jan. 6 attack on the Capitol. She told CNN she sat with the panel for an hour and “answered every question they asked of me, and I will continue to cooperate with them.”
She also told the network that the congressional investigators were interested in learning more about what was occurring in the White House as the pro-Trump mob was descending on the Capitol. Grisham resigned from her posts as Melania Trump’s communications director and chief of staff the evening of Jan. 6.
Grisham made headlines in recent months after publishing a book detailing her time in the Trump White House.
Asked by CNN how next week’s meeting with ex-Trump officials came to fruition, Grisham said it is the culmination of recent informal communications among individuals in the group.
“There were a few of us who, again, have been sitting back watching him continue to manipulate and spread this big lie and continue to harm our country, and started some informal chats,” Grisham said. “And then … started throwing around ideas of what we could do, how we could formalize it, started outreach to some other people and then, you know, it’s gonna culminate into this meeting next week and we’ll go from there.”
Grisham broke news of the planned meeting on the anniversary of the Jan. 6 attack on the Capitol. President Biden earlier in the day delivered a blistering rebuke of Trump in remarks delivered from Statutory Hall, in which he accused the former president of spreading a “web of lies” that laid the foundation for the deadly riot.
Updated: 10:05 p.m.