Tuesday on CNN’s “The Lead,” President Donald Trump’s counselor, Kellyanne Conway, had a tense 25-minute interview with host Jake Tapper.
Discussing the White House’s list of under-covered terror attacks, Tapper said, “I want to put up some footage of CNN reporters covering the attacks on that list. I spent two weeks in Paris in 2015 reporting on the attacks. We also see on the screen dozens of my colleagues, Alisyn Camerota covering the bombings in Brussels. Chris Cuomo and Anderson Cooper reporting on the supermarket attack in Paris. Brooke Baldwin covering the attack in Nice. Victor Blackwell reporting on the shootings in San Bernardino. Kellyanne, CNN and other media organizations cover terrorism around the world all the time. Saying that we don’t cover terrorism, that’s just false.”
Conway acknowledged CNN’s “amazing” coverage but then explained: “There seems to be some coverage these days, maybe not here, but definitely elsewhere that somehow terrorism is not a big problem, or somehow national security is all taken care of and that’s just not true. I think when you’re talking about extreme vetting, he is making the point that that is in response to the threat of terrorism globally.”
When Tapper asked Conway if she considers CNN “fake news,” Conway said, “I don’t think CNN is fake news. I think there are some reports everywhere, in print, on TV, on radio, in conversation that are not well researched and are sometimes based on falsehoods.”
Conway pressed Tapper on the stories about Trump’s inner circle being false saying, “Think about how small our staff was and how small our budget was for a presidential campaign, Jake, that succeeded and saw things other people didn’t. We breathe each other’s oxygen in the foxhole. We are all very close. All the palace intrigue stories for a White House that is constant action, constant movement — they’re just not true and they are actually beside the point and hurtful.”
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