MSNBC’s Lawrence O’Donnell Rages at ‘Stupidest’ White House Press Corps in ‘American History’
MSNBC’s Lawrence O’Donnell delivered a scathing takedown of the White House press corps on Tuesday night, accusing journalists of becoming little more than “accessories” to President Donald Trump’s administration and failing to hold him to account as he dodges critical questions.
The veteran anchor, speaking on The Last Word, used Trump’s evasive “You tell me” response to a direct question about the suspension of Ukraine military aid as the focal point of a broader attack on what he described as the “stupidest White House press corps in American history.”
“There was a moment in Donald Trump’s playing with the press today that shows everything all at once,” O’Donnell said. “It shows Donald Trump’s colossal stupidity in an exchange that he thinks shows how clever he is.”
The moment came as CNN’s Kaitlan Collins pressed Trump during a Cabinet meeting, with Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth seated next to him, on who had paused the weapons shipments to Ukraine without the president’s knowledge.
Trump shrugged off the question, saying, “I don’t know. Why don’t you tell me?” – before he swiftly moved on to another question.
O’Donnell argued that this exchange encapsulated not just presidential evasiveness, but a deeper issue within the press corps itself.
“Only Donald Trump has been able to beat down and humiliate White House reporters to the point where they take that for an answer meekly and shut up,” he said. “Not a single White House reporter is outraged. Not a single White House reporter raised a voice.”
O’Donnell touted his past as a writer on several scripts for NBC’s White House drama The West Wing, mockingly noting that no one could have predicted a “profoundly stupid” president would have been believable “because a stupid president’s stupidity would be immediately exposed by the White House press corps.”
O’Donnell said: “If I were writing the character of a stupid president in a script, I would simply have had the stupid president completely rely on a smart White House staff and a smart cabinet and just hide behind those people, and absolutely, and I mean absolutely, never talk to the press because a stupid president’s stupidity would be immediately exposed by the White House press corps.”
He continued: “And on that point, I would have been very wrong, because it turns out, the stupidest presidency in American history has the stupidest White House press corps in American history, as far as we can tell.”
Without naming particular journalists, O’Donnell paused for a caveat: “Some individual members of the White House press corps, and I want to stress this, remain excellent at their jobs, but they frequently don’t get to ask Donald Trump a question.”
He went on to accuse journalists in the room of playing along with Trump’s media theatre, describing them as “accessories” – in both the legal and fashion sense – to a presidency that, he says, weaponizes ignorance.
“He treats them like handbags or cufflinks, ornaments that he flashes around to pretend, and only pretend, that he is openly communicating about what he is doing in his workday,” the host said.
He continued: “He plays them for clowns, and they have no idea how to resist it. And I have to admit, if I were in the White House press corps, I’m not sure I would figure out how to resist it, except to maybe yell out some question about Donald Trump lying about something, and then I wouldn’t be in the White House press corps anymore. I would be shown out the door and that would be the end of that.”
Watch above via MSNBC.
