Washington, D.C. - At the President and the Press event at the Newseum Wednesday, five members of the White House press corps weighed in on their experience covering the first three months of the Trump presidency.
The audience was especially interested in what CNN’s Jim Acosta had to say, considering he has had some rather colorful exchanges with the president in his entertaining press conferences. Acosta, you’ll remember, was the reporter on the receiving end of Trump’s “fake news” retort back in January after his network reported on the unverified Russian dossier published by BuzzFeed. Acosta, however, has no regrets about pressing Trump for a question.
“My feeling is our news organization was being attacked and I felt I deserved a question to challenge him,” the journalist said. “Speaking truth to power means everything.”
That same night, Acosta said he received a message from a fellow reporter at another network who told him he did a great job at the press conference.
“I was defending all of us,” Acosta texted back.
If he had a do-over, Acosta said he would behave the same exact way. So, perhaps, would Trump, Acosta suggested, noting that Trump “enjoys the sparring back and forth.”
Acosta may have had unpleasant things to say about the Trump White House, but he claims he doesn’t want to isolate those who hold conservative ideologies.
“We need Republicans to believe in mainstream news media just as much as Democrats,” he said. “We need people to trust us.”
That may be a tall order. CNN’s distaste for the president has been on full display since Trump announced his presidency. During the campaign and even now nearly 100 days into Trump’s presidency, the network has aired segments with sarcastically written chyrons intended to troll the president. For instance, in a segment on Trump’s remarks about nuclear weapons, they displayed the following: "Trump: I never said Japan should have nukes (he did)."
Who can also forget when Acosta threw a tantrum after Trump’s joint press conference with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, where he only called on two conservative outlets: The Christianity Broadcasting Network and yours truly, Townhall. “The fix is in,” Acosta declared.
(It wasn’t.)