'Trump BOMBED': Nicolle on Trump's DERANGED attacks on press at White House Correspondents' Dinner

[0:00] So this is one of the most polarizing conversations within and about the media, [0:06] but for our part as a team, we thought it was important that we have it. Late Friday evening, [0:11] a large number of America's most prominent journalists, including some of the finest ones [0:16] in this very news organization, attended the White House Correspondents Dinner. They did that with [0:21] the president who the day before was stopped by a federal judge from forcing five New York Times [0:26] reporters to testify before a federal grand jury about sources and reporting that made him mad. [0:33] Such is the gravity and the reality of the threat Donald Trump poses right now to the First Amendment [0:40] and those who are protected by it. If journalists or their readers or their viewers or their listeners [0:47] were hoping that this rescheduled White House Correspondents Dinner, an event created and [0:52] intended to celebrate the First Amendment, would showcase a president ready to concede finally [0:57] the vital importance within a democracy of a free press, or a White House press corps finally [1:03] willing to draw the line at crude and cruel insults delivered by Donald Trump to their peers in the [1:11] press, some of them sitting among them, they would be tragically and sadly mistaken. [1:17] Donald Trump bombed in that his jokes fell completely flat, but he succeeded in forcing the press [1:22] inside the ballroom to listen to smears against their fellow journalists and jokes about his [1:28] autocratic fantasy of staying in power beyond his constitutionally permitted two terms. [1:33] It was a jarring image to witness Washington journalists laughing with the architect of Donald [1:38] Trump's inhumane child separation policy and deadly mass deportation agenda. It was equally jarring to see [1:47] others politely clap at the man who threatened the broadcast licenses of NBC and ABC. We do not intend with [1:54] our coverage today to single out any one journalist but to point to other threatened democracies and issue a [2:01] warning about the immediate dangers of cozying up to someone who aspires very publicly to take away the right [2:08] that all journalists have to cover Donald Trump and his administration. Other reporters shook Donald Trump's hand [2:14] and smiled after winning awards for courage and accountability for their reporting on Trump's [2:19] relationship with convicted child sex trafficker Jeffrey Epstein. Here's the presenter Wolf Blitzer [2:25] detailing what Donald Trump put these journalists through. Despite the president's threat of a lawsuit, [2:32] the journal published a story about a provocative letter to Epstein bearing President Trump's signature. [2:40] Trump quickly filed a $20 billion lawsuit against the journal, revealing reporter Khadija [2:47] Safdar's home address. Her family had to be relocated. The journal was kicked off of Air Force One, [2:56] but the reporters continue to file revelatory stories. When it was time for Donald Trump's keynote speech, [3:07] the journalists in the room endured petty and cruel insults for their colleagues, their friends and the [3:13] concept of democracy itself. And again, either out of deference or fear or agreement, we don't know, [3:20] some of them even applauded. As Status News puts it, quote, over the course of more than an hour, [3:25] Donald Trump offered a meandering and cringe-worthy speech that devolved into a barrage of personal [3:31] insults and crude attacks, stripping away any pretense that the evening would serve as a celebration [3:36] of the First Amendment. He derided CNN's Caitlin Collins with a vulgar personal attack. He slammed the [3:43] Wall Street Journal's Josh Dossie. He resurrected old insults for Gavin Newsom, Elizabeth Warren and [3:49] Chris Christie. He called J.B. Pritzker a, quote, fat pig. He demanded Congresswoman Omar, quote, get out [3:56] of our country. He trashed Jimmy Kimmel, Jimmy Fallon and Stephen Colbert as, quote, terrible and sick [4:03] people. The room responded largely with hushed silence as Donald Trump delivered one attack after [4:08] another. The result was a public humiliation for the White House Correspondents Association, all while [4:15] Donald Trump told them they should be grateful for it. Watch. But you people have no idea how lucky you [4:21] are. When I'm gone, you're all going to be broke. Your business model is going to be finished. No, it's [4:27] true. When I'm not around, you're going to be broke. There's not going to be anybody to report on. [4:32] Nobody gives a damn about anybody else. I want to save your ratings. I'm pleased to announce my [4:39] intention to, and this is a somewhat of a scoop, my intention to run for a fourth term as president [4:49] of the United States. I will be doing that. I will be having an official. In fact, I think I have. [4:56] Yeah, I won. I won three times. Now I'm going to do it again. Thank you. I'm going to do it. [5:12] And then they applauded, as you heard there on the tape. The White House Correspondents Association [5:17] embracing a man seeking to destroy everything they are supposed to stand for, as well as our [5:22] very democracy is where we begin today. Rather tragically, some of our favorite reporters and [5:27] friends, former CNN chief White House Correspondent and author of News Not Noise on Substack. [5:33] My old friend Jessica Yellen is here, and I'm so happy to see you. Also joining us, [5:36] voting rights attorney and founder of Democracy Docket, Mark Elias is back. I'm equally happy to see [5:41] you, my friend. And I'm always happy to see Puck News senior political columnist, [5:45] national affairs analyst John Hellman is here. Jessica, I start with you. I want to just put up [5:50] what you've already posted and then ask you to expand on it. You said, quote, [5:54] I think the invitation to the president outlived its purpose. He should not be invited in the [5:58] future, and the press should start standing up for one another in real time. I didn't play because [6:03] I don't really want to rebroadcast them. But I do want to share with anyone who was doing other [6:10] things over the weekend, what Donald Trump said about Caitlin Collins, who works at CNN, [6:15] where you were for many years. He said this, quote, I want to personally congratulate CNN's [6:20] Caitlin Collins on receiving her award. It was all about me. It was fake. She shouldn't get the [6:25] award. It was fake. But I didn't mind. I said, Caitlin, congratulations. But it was fake. [6:31] There's no question about it. But she's a young, attractive woman. She never smiles. [6:35] I said, Caitlin, do you ever smile? Smile. You have a nice position. You're at CNN fake news. [6:41] You should be a happy person. So smile, Caitlin, just smile. But we attack. And I thought Caitlin [6:47] really made it with a big, major new sponsorship. But then I informed her that it wasn't her on the [6:52] Bud Light can. It was Dylan Mulvaney. And Dylan Mulvaney cost Bud Light $35 million in market cap. [6:58] That was the worst commercial ever made, by the way. Your thoughts, not just to the president, [7:04] but the response he got. First, I thought it was an abomination. We should just acknowledge [7:10] Caitlin Collins is an exceptional reporter and a lovely person. And no one in this role should be [7:15] on the receiving end of that attack. His misogyny is well known. He does this to women journalists [7:20] in particular. But no one was off limits to him that night. You know, you mentioned at the beginning [7:26] something I had said, which is that this dinner in its current form has outlived its purpose. As you [7:32] and I both know, this dinner is sort of meant as a ritual of civility to demonstrate that even though [7:38] the press and the White House officials are adversarial by day, we are still Americans first [7:44] who share the same project, which is supporting democracy. And we're modeling that we can get along [7:50] even when there's conflict. That is no longer on the table. The president has put that to bed. [7:57] And participating in this event with him perpetuates a fiction that serves him and actually undermines [8:05] the public's trust in the press, I think. I'm not saying the dinner should end. I think this [8:09] dinner should continue. White House correspondents deserve their night of recognition and community, [8:14] but it can be done without inviting the president. And I think next year it would be an absolute tragedy [8:20] if the president is invited. They should get together and celebrate one another. And then you don't have [8:24] to worry about who's applauding what. I'll say maybe those applause came from administration [8:29] officials in the audience. I want to believe that. But I don't think they should have been invited next [8:34] year. Mark Elias, your thoughts? Look, I think that dinner should have been canceled years ago. I mean, [8:43] people are watching this video or and acting like somehow this is new. I mean, Donald Trump has been [8:50] a misogynist towards female reporters for years. He has attacked Caitlin Collins for years. He has been [8:57] lying about elections for years. What we saw him do on Friday night was nothing unexpected. It's more of [9:03] the same. And to me, you know, my my question to the journalist in the room is, why were you there? [9:10] I mean, why did you show up to a dinner that honors the president of the United States, this president [9:16] of the United States? You know, and when he started saying these things, why didn't you boo? Why didn't you [9:22] walk out? Why did you sit there and politely applaud or giggle or laugh or make small talk with Stephen Miller [9:30] or just eat? I mean, go eat someplace else. You know, the the the institutional corporate media [9:38] wonders why it is that it keeps losing, you know, the trust of the American public. It's dinners like [9:46] that is why you lose the trust of the American public, because Donald Trump is putting on a hat saying [9:50] he's running in 2028. And you're sitting there eating a dinner.