Maggie Haberman Stunned Trump Was Stumped at Cabinet Meeting by Kaitlan Collins
CNN commentator and New York Times White House correspondent Maggie Haberman told Anderson Cooper that it would be “pretty astonishing” if President Donald Trump’s Defense Department paused weapons shipments without his knowledge, as an exchange during a cabinet meeting and subsequent reporting appear to indicate.
Trump convened a lengthy and scattershot cabinet meeting on Tuesday amid the Texas flood disaster, during which he threatened the media, dropped a major whopper about CNN, attacked Chuck Schumer, bitterly complained about Russian President Vladimir Putin’s “bullshit,” and dove deep about his White House redecorations.
He also had a revealing exchange with CNN Senior White House Correspondent Kaitlan Collins, who asked him about last week’s pause in Ukraine weapons shipments:
COLLINS: So who ordered the pause last week?
TRUMP: I don’t know. Why don’t you tell me?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Mr. President–
COLLINS: I think that’s a question for the Pentagon.
Trump changed the subject rather than have Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth respond, but subsequent reporting by CNN indicates Hegseth ordered the pause without Trump’s knowledge.
On Tuesday night’s edition of CNN’s Anderson Cooper 360, Haberman marveled at the exchange with Collins:
COOPER: Maggie, how would it be possible that the president wouldn’t know that the U.S. had stopped sending, or paused, or whatever you call it, weapons to — more weapons to Ukraine?
HABERMAN: Just to go back to Alyssa’s point real quick, I do think the president is getting — is having trouble continuing to look at the death toll in Ukraine and not try to push Russia further. In terms of your question, I feel like there are still so many unanswered questions about exactly what happened here.
We have heard various versions of it. I know that CNN reported earlier that this was coming from DOD. Natasha Bertrand was correct in her reporting previously about what the Defense Intelligence Agency had shown in an early preliminary report about where it saw the immediate aftermath of the strikes on Iran.
You know, she put forward a multi-sourced story today. There still may be more to learn. It is hard to see that President Trump knew nothing about it, but not impossible. However, there was one person who could answer that question, two, actually.
One was President Trump, and Kaitlan tried, and he then said, you know, why don’t you tell me, which, you know, she doesn’t work for the administration.
Pete Hegseth sat there, also did not say anything. So I think more will be revealed here. If the Pentagon did do this on its own, it’s pretty astonishing.
Watch above via Anderson Cooper 360.
