Savannah Guthrie relied on her Today show skills in grilling President Trump at NBC's town hall

AP

"As host of the Today show, Guthrie knows the importance of time and how to stop an interview subject from filibustering," says David Bauder. "That background also teaches how to crystallize what an audience is thinking in a plain-spoken way, as evidenced in her most-quoted moment. She was incredulous when, after asking why Trump had retweeted a false conspiracy theory that American special forces didn’t really kill Osama bin Laden, he said that he 'just put it out there' to let people decide for themselves." “I don’t get that,” Guthrie said. “You’re the president. You’re not like you’re somebody’s crazy uncle who can just retweet anything.” Meanwhile, Variety's Brian Steinberg reports: "NBC didn’t make much noise about the event the day after it took place. There were no congratulatory memos issued by NBC News Group chief Cesar Conde or NBC News president Noah Oppenheim. NBC didn’t make Guthrie or executives available to discuss the event. One person familiar with the company said executives were trying to keep a 'forward-looking' stance, knowing that Kristen Welker, an NBC News White House correspondent and co-anchor of the weekend version of Today, was set to moderate the next debate organized by the Commission on Presidential Debates on Oct. 22."

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