‘That Is A Lie!’ CNN’s Abby Phillip Comes Down On Scott Jennings Over Trump Shutdown Talking Point
CNN anchor Abby Phillip swooped in to cut off GOP analyst Scott Jennings as he expounded on President Donald Trump’s shutdown messaging, interrupting to say “Scott, that’s a lie!”
President Donald Trump and the Republicans have blamed Democrats for the government shutdown by pushing the talking point that, as Trump put it in an AI-generated fake video, Democrats want to “give all these illegal aliens free health care.”
Although that claim has been ruled false by numerous fact-checkers, Vice President JD Vance joined the White House briefing on Wednesday to press the same talking point and try to backfill an explanation with some patter about emergency care.
On this week’s edition of CNN Saturday Morning Table for Five, Jennings pressed the point as well and earned a rebuke from Phillip, who told him “that’s not an issue that’s actually tied to immigration and you know it”:
SCOTT JENNINGS: Democrats, and some Republicans, I think, maybe many Republicans, I believe, will ultimately negotiate a continuation of these subsidies. Nobody wants health care premiums to go up. Although, I would note the political consultant Alex Castellanos is not all that affordable, as it turns out.
But the other debate about who is going to get taxpayer funded Medicaid in this country, that’s what the memes are about. That’s what the fight is about. Democrats want to make it about this subsidy issue. They don’t run out to the end of the year, by the way. But the real thing is they filed legislation to repeal what the Republicans did this summer.
And so these two issues have been conflated. But the fact is, they don’t just want the subsidies. They want other things. And the president is drawing attention to it, I think, in a pretty clever way. We just had a national emergency about telling jokes. I don’t know why people can’t take a joke.
ABBY PHILLIP: Medicaid is still not going to illegal immigrants, Scott.
JENNINGS: It is. It really does.
PHILLIP: It’s not.
JENNINGS: It really does. It does in several blue states.
PHILLIP: It’s not. Scott, no, it’s not.
JENNINGS: It really does.
PHILLIP: Listen, the part of the bill that deals with the money that goes to states, it doesn’t say anything about their immigration policy. So red state or blue state, those states are getting less money from the federal government. That still has to be dealt with. And that has nothing to do with immigration.
And again, Medicaid does not go to undocumented immigrants. SNAP does not go to undocumented immigrants. You know, CHIP does not go to undocumented immigrants.
JENNINGS: It absolutely does.
PHILLIP: I don’t know. I mean, Scott, prove me wrong.
JENNINGS: How many blue states —
PHILLIP: Show me the law.
JENNINGS: How many how many blue states? Mike Johnson showed it in a gigantic poster on Friday.
PHILLIP: Scott, show me the U.S. code where it says that they’re allowed to get Medicaid funding. JENNINGS: Where is it?
JENNINGS: I will show it on social media.
PHILLIP: It doesn’t exist. In fact, the law says exactly the opposite. So it’s —
JENNINGS: They’re trying to repeal what the Republicans did this summer.
PHILLIP: Scott, that is a lie, OK?
JENNINGS: It is not.
PHILLIP: Now, you might want to dispute whether or not states should get reimbursed from the federal — or should get federal dollars for Medicaid at the levels that they got it before. That’s a different issue. But that’s not an issue that’s actually tied to immigration and you know it.
Watch above via CNN Saturday Morning Table for Five.
