President Trump reignited his war against the news media at a major rally Tuesday evening, where attendees chanted “CNN sucks” and booed reporters in the crowd.
“Honestly, these are really, really dishonest people and they’re bad people. And I don’t think they really like our country,” Trump said of reporters. He described the media as an “elite” group of “sick people.”
Trump blasted CNN for mischaracterizing his response to the violence in Charlottesville, leading his sea of supporters in Phoenix to express their own disdain for the network with the chant.
“CNN is so bad and so pathetic,” the president riffed. “And they fired Jeffrey Lord. Poor Jeffrey. I guess he was getting a little fired up and he was fighting back a little too hard and they said, ‘we better get rid of him.'”
Lord, a steadfast supporter of Trump, was fired from CNN earlier this month after he referenced a Nazi salute – jokingly, he later said – during a heated exchange on Twitter.
Trump also bashed ABC News anchor George Stephanopoulos and called him “Little George” for focusing on Charlottesville after the president delivered a major speech Monday night about his administration’s Afghanistan strategy.
“I mean CNN is really bad, but ABC this morning – I don’t want it much but I’m watching in the morning and they have little George Stephanopoulos talking to [United States Ambassador to the UN] Nikki Haley,” Trump told the crowd. “He talks about the speech I made last night … then he goes, ‘let’s get back to Charlottesville.'”
