WATCH: GOP Congressman Wrecks Trump On Russia, Kimmel and More in Splashy CNN Interview

A retiring GOP congressman called out President Donald Trump on numerous fronts in a splashy new CNN interview.

Sitting down with host Manu Raju for a conversation which aired on CNN’s Inside Politics Sunday, Rep. Don Bacon (R-NE) criticized the president on everything from Russia, to his rhetoric in the wake of the assassination of Charlie Kirk, to Jimmy Kimmel. Raju began by pressing Bacon on Trump’s attacks on the media.

“The FCC chairman threatening to pull ABC’s broadcast license after this joke that Kimmel made about Charlie Kirk and MAGA and the like,” Raju said. “But then we saw Trump has sued The New York Times, sued the Wall Street Journal, told the Associated Press that it can’t cover him — at least they tried to.. And then we’ve seen them now talking about going after what they consider hate speech. There’s obviously a First Amendment in this country. Are you concerned about what the message that this sends to the country?”

“There have been some wrong statements made, to say the least,” Bacon replied. “When the Attorney General said that they were going to go after hate speech, she backed off of that, but it was wrong. And I think the president doing threats against media is also wrong. We don’t threaten the media. I think all right to say [Kimmel] was wrong, that information was false. I think there’s grounds for that. But to threaten media and say you’re going to pull their license, that’s not what America’s about. And we do have a freedom of speech, freedom of the press. And we should defend that.”

Bacon further called out Trump’s rhetoric following the shooting of Charlie Kirk — accusing the president of being divisive by focusing only on violence carried out by left-wing extremists.

“From the White House, we’re hearing this is just aliberal problem,” Raju said.

“It’s not very unifying,” Bacon said. “I don’t think it’s accurate, for one. And it’s not unifying.”

“Should Trump also tone down his rhetoric?” Raju asked.

“Absolutely,” Bacon said. He added, “Like I’ve mentioned before, he’s a populist. He centers on anger and opposition. That’s what he does. But he had a chance to be more Ronald Reagan and try to unify both sides on this. It would be one thing if it was all Republicans being murdered, but it’s not.”

Raju centered a subsequent question around Reagan, when the conversation turned to Russia.

“How do you think that Reagan would view how Trump is dealing with Putin?” Raju asked.

The congressman was unsparing.

“I think it would be bad,” Bacon said. “Reagan stood up to Gorbachev. I don’t see the moral clarity right now out of the White House. Ronald Reagan had moral clarity. Now, he also was willing to negotiate and try to lower the tensions. But he knew that communism was evil, and it was clear that he stood steadfast with our NATO allies. And the president sends out such mixed messages on NATO and totally immoral, ambiguous messages about Ukraine and Russia …it’s probably the thing that bothers me the most.”

“What about moral character?” Raju asked. “Do you think the president exhibits the kind of moral character you want to see in the leader of this country?”

“I’d rather focus on the moral clarity with Ukraine,” Bacon said.

“Well, a personal character,” Raju said. “I mean, that’s important.”

“It is,” Bacon said. “Well, if you want to be a leader, people got to trust you, and they got to know your word’s your bond.”

“Does he have the character that you want to see,” Raju said.

In what had been a very candid interview to that point, Bacon finally opted to pull his punches.

“Yeah… I think I’ll skirt around that,” the congressman said.

Watch above, via CNN.