‘Really Striking!’ CNN’s Kaitlan Collins and Maggie Haberman Stunned By Trump ‘Grifter Scam’ Slam From GOP Gov

New York Times correspondent and CNN analyst Maggie Haberman and CNN anchor Kaitlan Collins were stunned by remarks calling ex-President Donald Trump’s latest election ploy a “grifter’s scam.”

Kemp roundly rejected Trump’s call for his state to take action against Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis, which included the unvarnished view that he’s not going to be “focusing on the past or some grifter’s scam that somebody’s doing to help them raise a few dollars, into the campaign account.”

On Thursday night’s edition of CNN’s The Source with Kaitlan Collins, Collins played the remarks for Haberman — who revealed she hadn’t heard them before, and drew a laugh from Collins by quipping the jab was “subtle”:

COLLINS: Grifter’s scam, I mean?

MAGGIE HABERMAN, CNN POLITICAL ANALYST, SENIOR POLITICAL CORRESPONDENT, THE NEW YORK TIMES: It’s subtle. But if you listen closely, you can figure out what he’s talking about.

That is? So, I actually hadn’t heard that clip, until you just played it. It’s really, really striking. And it’s striking on a couple of fronts.

Kemp is someone, as you know, who not only resisted Donald Trump’s efforts, to subvert the election results, in 2020. He is somebody, who has repeatedly pushed back, on this, over the last two years. And he is someone, who defeated a Trump attempt, to try to take him down, in a primary.

And so, it is meaningful coming from him, because he is a Republican, who donors are focused on, who some Republican voters are focused on, as a future face of the party.

The fact that he is zeroing in, on Trump’s use, of his Super PAC, which is filled — or was once upon a time, filled with money? Now, doesn’t have very much money in it at all, filled with money, that he raised in the days and weeks after the election, on his claims that he needed money to combat widespread fraud that he insisted existed, which was never proven, and which has been debunked widely? That he is singling that out, in such stark terms, is quite revealing, about where he sees the race, right now.

COLLINS: Yes, I mean, there’s a lot of buildup, there, about what Republicans wish they were talking about.

HABERMAN: Right.

COLLINS: But then he calls it I mean, grifter’s scam.

HABERMAN: Yes.

COLLINS: And it made me remember, just a few weeks ago, he met with Governor DeSantis. He met with former Vice President Pence. I mean, he’s been talking, to these 2024 hopefuls, quietly. But they’ve been talking.

HABERMAN: Yes, he is looking at an alternative, to Donald Trump. Whether he is going to actually do something more, I think, remains to be seen.

Again, there’s two names that keep coming up, among donors. And donors are not great predictors, right, of where Republican primary politics are going, as we have seen, at least over the last two cycles, 2012, a little bit more so. But you hear Brian Kemp, and you hear Glenn Youngkin.

And so, I think that Brian Kemp has been pretty careful, about how he is projecting himself, and casting himself. But I do think he wants to be part of a broader conversation, about the future of the party. And you see that, as you said, in what he’s saying Republicans should be discussing.

Watch above via CNN’s The Source with Kaitlan Collins.