CNN’s Kaitlan Collins Fact Checks Jasmine Crockett Over Viral Falsehood About Trump Ballroom

CNN star Kaitlan Collins did not let Rep. Jasmine Crockett (D-TX) get away with pushing the debunked claim President Donald Trump’s top priority is the new $300 million ballroom he is building at the White House on Monday.

Crockett, during an appearance on The Source, was asked if she felt Congress would come to an agreement this week to end the government shutdown. The lawmaker said she had “no idea,” before transitioning to bashing the president for going to Japan while the shutdown continued.

“The president has time to do everything but what he needs to focus on. In fact, we heard the press secretary say his main priority is the ballroom — the ballroom that no one asked for. The ballroom that requires him to destroy historic pieces of the White House. And so it doesn’t seem like he’s interested [in the shutdown],” said Crockett.

But that story is not exactly true.

White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt did say Trump’s “main priority” is the ballroom — but that was in response to a question about whether Trump had “any other renovations or significant kind of projects” in mind, in addition to the ballroom and Rose Garden patio revamp.

“Not to my knowledge, no” Leavitt said last week. “But he’s a builder at heart, clearly. And so his heart and his mind is always churning about how to improve things here on the White House grounds. But at this moment in time, of course, the ballroom is really the president’s main priority.”

Her comment was clipped by Acyn Torabi — senior digital editor for the progressive outlet MeidasTouch — and shared to X. It was captioned, “Leavitt: At this moment in time, the ballroom is really the president’s main priority.”

Many liberals were upset by it and shared it, including California Governor Gavin Newsom (D) and Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-NY).

Collins, on Monday night, politely stepped in to block Crockett from doing the same thing without being fact checked.

“Yeah, and that context of the comment from Karoline Leavitt, she was asked if the president was working on any other renovations when it came to the White House, and she was saying his focus was the ballroom,” Collins said.

Collins did not give her an opening to say anything else on the topic, because she quickly shifted to a question on SNAP benefits ending.

Watch above via CNN.