President-elect Donald Trump on Wednesday would not let a reporter from CNN ask him a question during a press conference, saying that he worked for a “fake news” company.
The contentious exchange happened after Trump trashed a report CNN published Tuesday that said the U.S. intelligence community had presented him with allegations that the Russian government had compromising, but unverified, information about him.
“Could you give us a chance, you’re attacking our news organization, can you give us a chance to ask a question, sir?” CNN’s Jim Acosta asked him.
“Don’t be rude. I’m not going to give you a question,” Trump responded. “You are fake news.”
After the news conference, Acosta said on air that Sean Spicer, the incoming White House press secretary, told him that “if I were to do that again, I was going to be thrown out of this press conference.”
CNN released a statement in response to the exchange, which Jake Tapper read on air:
CNN’s decision to publish carefully sourced reporting about the operations of our government is vastly different than Buzzfeed’s decision to publish unsubstantiated memos. The Trump team knows this. They are using Buzzfeed’s decision to deflect from CNN’s reporting, which has been matched by the other major news organizations. We are fully confident in our reporting. It represents the core of what the First Amendment protects, informing the people of the inner workings of their government; in this case briefing materials prepared for president Obama and president-elect trump last week.
We made it clear that we were not publishing any of the details of the 35-page document because we have not corroborated the report’s allegations. Given that members of the trump transition team have so vocally criticized our reporting, we encourage them to identify, specifically, what they believe to be inaccurate.
Watch the exchange below:
This post has been updated.
If the rest of the press corps had any dignity they would have refused to ask him any at that point.
Says the fake President.
With fake hair.
And a fake business.
Leading a fake party.
Of fake patriots.
Agreed. They should have stood in solidarity. But they’re just corporate drones looking for ratings at this point.
When he speaks of fake news we should all pay attention. He knows of what he speaks! Directly!
The average American won’t put up with the bullshit for very long. The Whiner-in-Chief has a pretty short leash as it is judging by his poll numbers.