Florida’s attorney general claims she was unfairly blindsided in her CNN interview this week with Anderson Cooper.
Pam Bondi, a Republican, said she expected to discuss how to prevent victims and their families from being exploited by scammers. But she said on Fox & Friends Thursday morning that “he cut me off,” and demanded she explain how she could support the gay community when she previously argued against same-sex marriage.
Cooper asked if her new support for LGBT people after her opposition to same-sex marriage amounts to “hypocrisy.”
“There’s a time and place for everything … to incite anger and hatred was not the time nor the place in front of a hospital,” said Bondi.
Bondi claimed in a Wednesday radio interview she has received “horrible hatred emails and texts” after the interview. She also said she fears that people seeking information “will not trust my office” to help them.
She said she agreed to the interview to discuss relief efforts for victims of the tragedy and to inform the public about potential scam charities. But CNN cut out that portion in the clip the network posted online, she said.
Cooper said Wednesday that her claims were “factually incorrect” and that Bondi is “either mistaken or not telling the truth.” He said interviews are routinely edited by CNN before being posted online, but stressed the full conversation is now available.
Based on notes provided by her staff before the interview, he said there was never a prior agreement to focus only on potential fundraising scams.
And because she has spoken out about “embracing the LGBT community,” Cooper argued that it’s not “unfair to look at her record and see if they have ever spoken that way before.”
“Let’s be real here. Ms Bondi’s big complaint seems to be that I asked in the first place in the wake of a massacre that targeted gay and lesbian citizens about her new statements about the gay community and about her old ones,” said Cooper.
Bondi said on Fox & Friends in response. “I get it, he’s hurt, he’s a champion for the LGBT community … I was happy to have the opportunity to go on with somebody who cares.”
