Sean Spicer book summary: The most important moments as White House press secretary reveals life working for Trump

Spicer helped spin, twist and reject the truth on behalf of Donald Trump – but now he has promised to reveal the reality of speaking for the president

Sean Spicer resigns: The White House Press Secretary's most memorable moments

Donald Trump's mouthpiece is finally talking for himself.

Sean Spicer's book – The Briefing: Politics, The Press and The President – has just been published and offers and unprecedented look into the workings of the White House and its sometimes bizarre, often controversial relationship with the press.

And we will be reading the book live, just as it makes its way from the press itself.

It is the latest in a series of bombshell books detailing life inside Trump's White House. From Michael Wolff's incendiary Fire and Fury to James Comey's combative A Higher Loyalty, many of Mr Trump's foes and confidantes have attempted to peer inside the president's head and work out what is going on.

But Spicer's is the first major release from one of the president's allies. And what an ally he has been: Spicer was famous for defending Trump over and over, even when that meant outright lying or appearing to suggest the holocaust didn't happen.

Now the erstwhile press secretary and communications director will finally give his insight on working for Trump, and helping create the image of the president we have today.

Please allow a moment for the live blog to load.

[24 July 2018 16:11 · Andrew Griffin]

Spicer describes watching Trump do an interview shortly after the Comey firing, in which he called the FBI director a "showboat" and a "grandstander'.

I knew what Donald Trump was thinking: Here I am, a president who has begun to dismantle the regulatory state, reshape the appellate bench to conservative principles, establish policies that favor economic growth, and reset international relationships to better serve the needs of this country—yet day in and day out, I have to deal with this other narrative on Russia.

Does anyone in the entire world believe that's how Trump's internal monologue goes? I don't.

[24 July 2018 16:15 · Andrew Griffin]

It's not just stories about himself that Spicer spends time in this book being frustrated with. There's stories about other people, too.

So, for example, he talks about a story in Business Insider that suggested that Gary Cohn's low salary was reflective of his place in the pecking order. But Spicer points out that he'd asked for that salary, and that he also had a salary and bonus at Goldman Sachs that was worth more than $7 million.

All sounds fair enough. But why is Spicer spending all this time talking about one particular report in Business Insider?

[24 July 2018 16:20 · Andrew Griffin]

Another little Arrested Development moment from Sean Spicer, now. This time, it's that famous video of him being yelled at in the Apple Store.

It is told with a classic Spicer-ian combination of confusion and weariness. He says that among other things he was in the Apple Store because he wanted to buy an Apple Watch for his wife, and now he had to work very hard to make sure that the surprise wasn't ruined.

[24 July 2018 16:26 · Andrew Griffin]

Into the final chapter, "The Way Forward", in which we can presume that Spicer lays out his suggestions about where things should go.

[24 July 2018 16:33 · Andrew Griffin]

Spicer is talking about Scaramucci. And, mostly, he's complaining about him: that he's mean about his own staff, that he wasn't very good at his job, and so on. And he takes obvious relish in the important moment when Scaramucci took part in a conversation with the New Yorker's Ryan Lizza that involved him giving a whole set of aggressive and humiliating comments.

Spicer just writes out all of those comments, noting that each of them wasn't an especially good thing to say.

[24 July 2018 16:37 · Andrew Griffin]

"As I prepared to leave the White House, and in the months thereaf- ter, I had plenty of time to reflect on the relationship between elected officials and the media—what is wrong with it and the best way forward," Spicer notes. It's all the stuff we've been through before – that it's obsessed with palace intrigue, rather than issues of substance; that they rush to stories; that they want to make a name for themselves; that reporters tend to a pack mentality; and other changes like the fact that the news and opinion have merged.

This piece is all stuff that we've heard before, and it's very inside baseball. It's also probably a little disenguous: Spicer is admitting no fault here, and placing plenty of blame on the press. But it is probably the most vociferous, well-argued part of the book, and deals with Spicer's actual work rather than what was going on around him.

[24 July 2018 16:42 · Andrew Griffin]

We're drawing to a close. And Spicer seems a little regretful:

I hope to play a role in creating a more constructive dialogue and restoring civil discourse. I will strive to be less aggressive and accusatory, less judgmental, more patient, and more understanding. Will I be perfect? No. But will I try, and I will learn.

He ends with some discussion of his family and his father.

And then he quotes from scripture:

Set a guard over my mouth, Lord; keep watch over the door of my lips.

It's perhaps a strange passage. But it's probably a fitting one for perhaps the most famous mis-speaker in the world.

[24 July 2018 16:43 · Andrew Griffin]

That's the book all over! Thanks for following along everyone. Some thoughts and reflections to follow.

[24 July 2018 16:58 · Andrew Griffin]

Some final thoughts after a day in Sean Spicer's company:

1. He is still an insider, even on the outside.

This is the first major book to emerge from inside the White House. And it took leaving for that to happen: it is all part of Spicer's attempt to create a post-Trump administration career.

But he is not free of that administration. This is written like a book from the insider: there is not a single embarrassing moment, very little criticism of anyone at all, and very little regret is voiced. Even at those points when Spicer and Trump weren't aligned – it's important to remember that Spicer was a key part of the RNC establishment that Trump so railed against during his campaign – Spicer is keen to present himself as having spotted Trump's potential early on, and to make clear that even when they disagreed they never fell out.

It could have been a story of palace intrigue, of Trump's court, finally told by someone who inhabited it. But the problem that makes the real heart of the administration a black hole continues: everyone who really knows anything about Trump is also viciously loyal to him. You are either inside or outside.

2. He doesn't know what is interesting about himself – or he does, and is keeping it a secret

A lot of this book is spent telling stories about important parts of the presidency: election night, at its beginning, or the firing of Reince Priebus at its end. But Spicer isn't actually there for those – during election night he's on a separate floor away from the president – and so it is mostly like reading a history book about the present, in Spicer's voice.

For those moments he was there, he is anxious about revealing anything, presumably for the reasons laid out above. Spicer occasionally admits to being upset or anxious – but for the most part, it's like someone else is telling the story for him.

3. He is a buffoon

Spicer is the hero of this book. It's possible to imagine that it would have taken the form of a redemption or blistering correction, in which he would attempt to make clear that he wasn't as much of a klutz as he had always seemed.

And he seems, at time, to think he's doing that. But the buffoonery and vague hints of the Curb Your Enthusiasm theme that play in your head throughout the book hang over it all.

None of that is to say that he isn't also evil (or that, if you agree with him, he isn't good). It is only to say that Spicer's reputation as a man who makes embarrassing mistakes isn't much in doubt, even if only by him.

4. But he has lots of ideas

On the media, on taxes, on plenty of other things besides – large parts of the book read like broadsides or essays, rather than memoir. He has ideas for how the press should cover Trump, for instance, which he describes at length and repeatedly.

Some of these are not terrible ideas. But they don't come with a balancing recognition that he may have made mistakes, too – that the aggressive conversations he had with the press included two sides, not just the one. Spicer appears to be making a play to become more friendly with the liberal media, noting at the end that he can now go to restaurants without being shouted at, but his critiques will surely only be accepted if they apply to himself, too.

5. He holds plenty of grudges

From memes about himself, to false reports about everybody else, Spicer is not forgetting. He wants you to know that he's very much not upset about those things – that he founder Melissa McCarthy's impression of him funny, and that some of the memes shared online were sweet – but that he still remembers them, and perhaps that he won't ever forget.