CNN’s Abby Phillip Calls Trump Out Over Outrageous Email — Even Pro-MAGA Analyst Calls It ‘Abhorrent’

CNN anchor Abby Phillip called out President Donald Trump for failing to apologize for a fundraising email that even pro-Trump CNN analyst Shermichael Singleton called “abhorrent.”

Many are outraged about a fundraising email from a Trump PAC that featured a photo from the dignified transfer that Trump attended last week in a campaign baseball cap.

When a reporter confronted him about the email on Sunday, Trump said “I do” when asked if it was appropriate, but claimed he hadn’t seen the email. He then defended his standing with the military and attacked the reporter. He did not apologize.

On Monday’s edition of CNN NewsNight, Singleton said Trump and his administration should “apologize” for the “abhorrent” email, and fellow GOP analyst Brad Todd agreed. But Phillip pointed out that “they didn’t do that”:

ABBY PHILLIP: It’s not just the solicitation email. I mean, last week we were talking about the video game analogies that they were making on social media about this war. And there’s a kind of flippant nature to some of this. I mean, it was — this is striking to me, the President took a phone call today from a reporter because apparently everybody in Washington has his personal cell phone number.

And according to Liz Landers, Trump said that he was literally in and very important meeting about the Iran war. And he picks up his phone to talk to a journalist. Again, that’s something that is stunning for me to even read as a journalist, because usually you can’t even bring a phone into those spaces.

But there’s a lot that the President’s doing that makes this, everything is in service of making the point that he’s being tough and not dealing with the tough consequences.

SHERMICHAEL SINGLETON: On the email point, I want to just address this because the general public is probably not aware that I looked into how this committee was actually structured. It’s a 527 independent expenditure committee. So when we’re saying that this President or hell, any President for that matter is cooperating or working directly with whomever is running that organization, structurally that’s not correct.

I mean, obviously the photo is just abhorrent and I think everybody was right to call it out as they should have. But the structure–

PHILLIP: I didn’t say that he was working with them or not.

SINGLETON: But I’m just adding clarity. I was just looking at the Chiron and it was in the Trump committee. And that’s structurally not correct. And people who don’t work in politics probably wouldn’t know this in terms of writing copy, I also make this point. I mean, I’ve written copies for many campaigns I’ve worked on in the past, you’re not working with the White House typically on that copy.

And so I think I would probably —

HINOJOSA: He never condemned it.

SINGLETON: I was going to get to that point.

HINOJOSA: Sorry.

SINGLETON: So I think in that regard, the White House would be correct in saying, look, we don’t know who’s operating or running this committee. We condemn this, we want to make sure all committees that are functioning in the President’s name are functioning properly, specifically as it pertains to our troops who’ve lost their lives. But again, just adding that clarity point in terms of the structure.

PHILLIP: They would be right to do that. They didn’t do it. And I think that’s part of the problem.

Watch above via CNN NewsNight.

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