‘Clown Show!’ MSNBC’s Lawrence O’Donnell Rips ‘Weak and Ineffectual’ WH Press Pool for Not Challenging Trump in Cabinet Meeting

MSNBC host Lawrence O’Donnell slammed the White House pool reporters in attendance at Wednesday’s Cabinet meeting for not challenging various claims from President Donald Trump and Elon Musk.

In a scathing commentary to open his show Wednesday night, O’Donnell argued the press pool treated Trump much more gently than his predecessor, former President Joe Biden.

“Donald Trump took questions from very tame, very well behaved, mild mannered members of the White House press corps in the Cabinet Room — who did not scream questions at him the way they always screamed their questions at Joe Biden,” O’Donnell said. “They didn’t. And the way they screamed their questions at Joe Biden’s press secretary. They didn’t do that. And to every question, Donald Trump gave a response that included at least one lie. Every single one of them.”

O’Donnell also took umbrage with a National Journal article that credited Trump with taking more than 1,000 questions from the press during his first month in office. As far as the MSNBC host is concerned, the number is immaterial because the substance of Trump’s answers is lacking.

“There’s nothing the Washington press corps cares about more than asking presidents questions,” O’Donnell said. “And I mean, they care about the questions. They do not care about the answers, and they prove that they do not know that a lie is not an answer.”

O’Donnell cited a claim from Trump that the U.S. has spent $350 billion on Ukraine aid since the start of the war with Russia — which the president said was more than triple all European nations combined. Fact-checkers put the figure at half of that, or less — and say that Europe has given more than the U.S.

The MSNBC host ripped the press pool for the lack of pushback on that point.

“Not a single White House reporter objected in any way, challenged Donald Trump in any way about telling that lie straight to them,” O’Donnell said. “They just counted it as another question answered by Donald Trump.

“There are some very good White House reporters. Very good. But enough of them are so weak and ineffectual that they become essential components of the clown show themselves!” raged O’Donnell. “They are characters in the clown show. Elon Musk turns them into clowns by lying to them and getting away with it right in front of them, with none of them daring to challenge Elon Musk’s lies directly to them. And of course, they do the same thing with Donald Trump. They’ve always done the same thing with Donald Trump.”

Watch above, via MSNBC.