Jonathan Karl Says Events Have ‘Vindicated Jim Acosta,’ After Criticizing ‘Embarrassing’ Clashes With Trump in His Book

ABC News Chief White House Correspondent Jonathan Karl addressed his criticism of fellow White House press corps member Jim Acosta in an interview with Mediaite out Thursday.

Speaking with Mediaite’s Aidan McLaughlin for The Interview podcast, Karl offered praise for Acosta when asked about criticism leveled at the CNN reporter in his book published earlier this year. Karl wrote that Acosta was “playing into the explicit Trump strategy of portraying the press as the opposition party,” in his book Front Row at the Trump Show. 

The ABC News reporter — who, as president of the White House Correspondents’ Association defended Acosta from the administration’s attempt to revoke his press pass — described in his book a particularly tense confrontation between Acosta and Trump as “embarrassing” for both sides.

“The surest way to undermine the credibility of the White House press corps is to behave like the political opposition,” Karl wrote. “Don’t give speeches from the White House briefing room.” Karl later told The Daily Beast at a book party in April that he had “some issues” with the style in which Acosta has reported on President Donald Trump. “We can be tough, we can call out things that are not true, we can be aggressive in our questioning, but I don’t think we should act like we are part of the resistance.”

McLaughlin addressed this on The Interview, asking, “Do you think that the press has fallen into the trap of becoming a body of resistance to Trump?”

“There is a big chunk of the country that believes the press is now the resistance,” Karl said initially. “And I think that’s unfortunate. And I think that it has negative consequences for a free press. I think it has negative consequences for our democracy.”

“But I think that the aggressive questioning of the president, particularly now in the wake of what we’ve seen unfold with the pandemic, is absolutely necessary. Not only justified but necessary,” he hedged before addressing the CNN reporter.

“And I was quite critical of Jim Acosta. I also believe Jim Acosta is a fine reporter,” Karl said. “And I think that events that have played out since those early days of the Trump White House have in some ways vindicated Jim Acosta. I think that Jim was right to be outraged that the president was declaring a free press an enemy of the people.”

“I was too. He expressed it in a more pointed way. And I respect that. Frankly, if I was writing the book right now, I would probably write a little bit differently about Jim. I understand fully where he was coming from. I wouldn’t have done it in the same way. I didn’t do it in the same way. But I respect where he was coming from.”

Listen to the specific portion of the podcast above.