'I understand that there were a lot of tweets. I didn’t follow it carefully,' he said Lehrer says he was 'effective'

Jim Lehrer has been widely criticized for his passive performance as moderator of Wednesday’s night’s presidential debate, but in his first post-debate interview, he tells POLITICO that he was simply fulfilling his new mission, which was to allow the candidates to engage one another without interruption.

“Based on what the goal was, I saw it as successful,” Lehrer told POLITICO. “I’ve always said this and finally I had a chance to demonstrate it: The moderator should be seen little and heard even less. It is up to the candidates to ask the follow-up questions and challenge one another.”


( Also on POLITICO: Media piles on moderator Lehrer)

“I don’t consider that being passive, I consider it being effective,” he said. “It’s not my job to control the conversation. If the candidates gave me resistance, and I let them talk, to me that’s being an active moderator, not a passive moderator.”

Both President Barack Obama and GOP nominee Mitt Romney commended Lehrer’s performance, but he was heavily criticized by politicians and pundits across the political spectrum for rarely challenging the candidates and for backing down from confrontation almost every time he tried to interject himself into the conversation.

( PHOTOS: Presidential debate moderators)

Fox News host Chris Wallace criticized Lehrer for seeming to “lose some control” of the candidates, while MSNBC host Chris Matthews “said the moderator did not moderate.” Discussing the multiple instances in which Romney spoke over Lehrer, Obama spokeswoman Stephanie Cutter said she “sometimes wondered if we even needed a moderator because we had Mitt Romney.”

But Lehrer said that the new debate format, in which candidates each get two minutes to answer a question and an additional 11 minutes to debate with one another, was meant to give the moderator a less active role.

( Also on POLITICO: Wallace: Lehrer could have been better)

“I came away thinking this was a very successful debate because we accomplished what the mission was,” he said.

“The goal of the new format was to have the candidates talk directly to one another, in an extensive way, about things that matter,” he said. “One of the problems is that everybody is used to the old-fashioned debate system, which is very controlled, and where the moderator plays a more active role. But from the very beginning, everybody has been saying that what we really want is to have a real debate, not to have a moderator conducting a pseudo interview.”

Lehrer said he was aware of the criticism, but that he would have no trouble putting it behind him.

“I understand that there were a lot of tweets. I didn’t follow it carefully,” he said. “Everybody was learning here.”

“I’m not suggesting that everything I did was terrific,” he continued. “But we’re defining terrific here, in front of 67 million people. So yes, I’ve heard some of the criticism, but it’s not keeeping me awake at night. My conscience is clear.”

Though he defended his low-key role, there were many times throughout the debate when Lehrer tried to interrupt a candidate and was unsuccessful in doing so. On at least three or four occasions, Romney continued talking right over Lehrer, and Lehrer backed off. At another point, Lehrer informed Obama that his time was up, only to have the president smile and say, “I had five seconds left before you interrupted me,” and go right on talking.

Lehrer acknowledged that he wasn’t always successful in controlling the conversation but said that wasn’t his role.

“I didn’t see it as somebody talking over me. Yes, there were times when I wanted to stop them. Sometimes, I could get them to do it, sometimes not, but this is all part of the learning process,” he said.

Lehrer also said he was happy with the new, open debate format and preferred it to the traditional model in which the moderator dictates each exchange between the candidates.

“I am confident this is the way to go. It can be tweaked and improved upon, but this is the root,” he said. It gives the candidates a chance to engage with one another, and it’s more revealing than any other format I’ve seen.”

Lehrer would not comment on how the two candidates performed, though he said he was unfazed by Romney’s remark about cutting federal funding for PBS, where Lehrer is executive editor of “PBS Newshour.”

“I had absolutely no reaction. It didn’t surprise me at all,” Lehrer said.

Lehrer has moderated 12 presidential debates now, making him the most experienced debate moderator in history. Prior to the debate, Lehrer’s colleagues and contemporaries told POLITICO that he had a religious commitment to fairness and modesty. Lehrer, they said, has a reputation for staying out of the story.

That changed with the onslaught of criticism that followed Wednesday night’s debate in Denver. The next day, Lehrer was accosted in an airport by a cameraman from TMZ, the Hollywood-based gossip website — a sign of just how much national attention Lehrer had received.

Lehrer, who confessed to not knowing the cameraman was with TMZ, said that such attention is inevitable when 67 million watch an event and you’re one of the three men on the stage.

“Yes, some of that attention has come to me and I’m not comfortable with that, I could do without that,” he said. “It’s not about the moderator, and it shouldn’t be. But it’s inevitable.”

Asked if he would accept an invitation to moderate another presidential debate in 2016, Lehrer said he “couldn’t conceive of saying yes to that.” But, after promising once before to stay out of presidential debates, then accepting this year’s invitation, he’s learned never to say never.

“But let’s put it this way,” he said. “On a zero-to-10 scale, it’s negative-one.”