Katie Porter Gets Flayed Over Stunning Interview Meltdown — by Her Own Side

Former Congresswoman and current candidate for governor Katie Porter (D-CA) took heavy criticism over her meltdown during an interview that went viral — including from her own side of the political spectrum.

Investigative journalist and California Capitol Accountability Correspondent Julie Watts of CBS News Sacramento interviewed Porter and 10 other California gubernatorial candidates last month about term-limited Governor Gavin Newsom’s (D-CA) redistricting plan.

When the full program dropped this week, Porter’s responses to one particular question rocketed around social media. Watts asked “What do you say to the 40% of California voters, who you’ll need in order to win, who voted for Trump?”

Things quickly went off the rails when Porter quipped “How would I need them in order to win, ma’am?” and Watts drilled down on that aside. Porter threatened to end the interview and coined some truly meme-able quotes:

FMR. REP. KATIE PORTER (D-CA): I feel like this is unnecessarily argumentative. What is your question?

JULIE WATTS: The question is, the same thing I asked everybody, that this is being called the Empowering Voters to Stop Trump’s Power Grab. Every other candidate has answered this question. This is not argumentative.

FMR. REP. KATIE PORTER (D-CA): Correct, and I said, I support it.

JULIE WATTS: So, and the question is what do you say to the 40 percent of voters who voted for Trump?

FMR. REP. KATIE PORTER (D-CA): Oh, I’m happy to say that. It’s the do-you-need-them-to-win part that I don’t understand. I’m to answer– ask the question as you have it written, and I’ll answer it.

JULIE WATTS: And we’ve also asked the other candidates, do you think you need any of those 40% of California voters to win? And you’re saying, no, you don’t.

FMR. REP. KATIE PORTER (D-CA): No, I’m saying I’m going to try to win every vote I can. And what I’m saying to you is that…

JULIE WATTS: Well, to those voters, OK, so you…

FMR. REP. KATIE PORTER (D-CA): I don’t want to keep doing this. (CLAPS) I’m gonna call it. Thank you.

JULIE WATTS: You’re not going to do the interview with us.

FMR. REP. KATIE PORTER (D-CA): Nope, not like this. I’m not. Not with seven follow-ups to every single question you ask.

JULIE WATTS: Every other candidate has answered our follow-ups.

FMR. REP. KATIE PORTER (D-CA): I don’t care. I wanna have a pleasant, positive conversation in which you asked me about every issue on this list.

And if every question, you’re gonna make up a follow-up question, then we’re never gonna get there.

JULIE WATTS: Miss Porter–.

FMR. REP. KATIE PORTER (D-CA): And we’re just gonna circle around.

JULIE WATTS: I am an investigative reporter.

FMR. REP. KATIE PORTER (D-CA): I have never had to do this before, ever.

JULIE WATTS: You’ve never had to have–.

FMR. REP. KATIE PORTER (D-CA): To end an interview. To end an interview.

JULIE WATTS: –a conversation with a reporter? Okay. But every other candidate has done this

FMR. REP. KATIE PORTER (D-CA): What part of I’m me–? I’m running for governor because I’m a leader so I am going to make–.

JULIE WATTS: So you’re not going to answer questions from reporters?

Okay, why don’t we go through, I will continue to ask follow-up questions because that’s my job as a journalist, but I will go through and ask these and if you don’t wanna answer, you don’t wanna answer. So, nearly every legislative–.

FMR. REP. KATIE PORTER (D-CA): I don’t want to have an unhappy experience with you, and I don’t want this all on camera.

JULIE WATTS: I don’t want to have an unhappy experience with you either.

The exchange racked up millions of views and scores of caustic comments from high-profile political and media figures. There were many from prominent conservatives like Sen. Ted Cruz (R-TX), who wrote, “Crazy lady freaks out when journalists ask her actual ‘questions.’”

But Porter was also lambasted by mainstream political media figures and prominent liberal-leaning personalities.

WSJ’s Josh Dawsey wrote “I didn’t fully understand why this video was going viral until I watched it all… and wow.”

“Not a good look,” said Chris Cillizza.

California political journo Elex Michaelson read into the exchange a controversial strategy:

This clip of Katie Porter’s displeasure is going viral. Porter may be hinting at a primary strategy: use her campaign’s $ to lift up a Republican into the “top two” for the general election. Adam Schiff did this with Steve Garvey in their U.S. Senate race & boxed Porter out.

Prominent Democratic strategist Lis Smith said “This is simply not how to run for office or how to deal with the media. And if this [is] how someone acts on camera, imagine how they act off camera.”

Liberal influencer Adam Mockler cracked “Update: Katie Porter is holding a reporter hostage in our control room.”

The hits kept coming:

Watch above via Julie Watts Investigates.