CNN’s Jim Acosta Hits Trump With Zinger Over ‘Violent’ Language

CNN anchor Jim Acosta dropped a one-liner during a discussion of former President Donald Trump’s “bloodbath” remarks and his comments about Jews who vote for Democrats.

The week has been dominated by discussion of inflammatory remarks by Trump. First, he took criticism over remarks at a rally in which he said “If I don’t get elected, it’s going to be a bloodbath for the whole — that’s going to be the least of it. It’s going to be a bloodbath for the country” — and insisted he was only referring to the auto industry.

Trump is also under fire for comments he made in an interview with Sebastian Gorka Monday.

“Any Jewish person that votes for Democrats hates their religion. They hate everything about Israel and they should be ashamed of themselves because Israel will be destroyed,” Trump said.

On Wednesday’s edition of CNN Newsroom, Acosta hosted Ruth Ben-Ghiat and Tom Nichols to discuss Trump’s rhetoric.

When Ben-Ghiat placed the remarks in context with other Trump language like his Jan. 6 speech, Acosta quipped “He’s saying the riot part out loud”:

JIM ACOSTA: And this comes after he said that any Jewish person who votes for Democrats hates their religion, hates everything about Israel. Ruth. I mean, he keeps dabbling in these tropes. What’s going on here?

RUTH BEN-GHIAT: Yeah. Well, you know, your previous segment was about immigrants. The thing is, everyone thinks that if they’re not X category, they’re not going to be touched by an autocrat. Everybody’s touched.

So in this case, he’s talking about he’s raising the old anti-Semitic trope of, you know, Jews not being loyal citizens because they’re real loyalties to Israel. And he’s done this many times before. I want to add to something that Tom said, though, about the bloodbath.

There’s a real intent here, and that is, and Trump’s been doing this. All autocrats do this. If you want to, get people riled up enough to either commit violence for you January 6th or accept your violence, you need to get them into a state of existential fear and dread.

And so on January 6th, he said, “If we don’t fight like hell, we won’t have a country anymore.”.

With strongmen, it’s always me or the abyss, me or the apocalypse. So when he’s talking about social slaughter, he’s telling people that they have to defend themselves. And he’s done this many times in his rallies and now in his campaign. This is part of his message to keep people when he says, they’re not really going for me. They’re actually after you, and I’m just standing in the way. So that’s what this is about as well.

JIM ACOSTA: Yeah. I mean, Tom, he’s he saying the riot part out loud, it seems.

Watch above via CNN’s CNN Newsroom.