Washington: When Donald Trump targeted CNN journalist Kaitlan Collins in the Oval Office this week, his words struck a familiar, gendered refrain.
“CNN is a very corrupt organisation, with a corrupt reporter standing right there,” he said on Wednesday. “Never smiles. She’s a young, beautiful woman, never smiles. I never see a smile off her face. I see her standing there with hatred in her eyes.”
The cable news anchor, who is one of the most well-known and respected political journalists in the US, had not asked a question or uttered a word at that point in the news conference.
Later, when Collins asked about the cancellation of Trump’s $US1.8 billion ($2.5 billion) compensation fund for supposed victims of government weaponisation by the Democrats, the president again turned on her.
“People like you have abused our people so badly,” he said. “You should be ashamed of yourself. You used to be a conservative. She was a conservative from Alabama, can you believe it.”
Collins then made her only protest: “I’m still from Alabama.”
The interaction added to a number of incidents where Trump has targeted female journalists, including telling a Bloomberg News reporter “quiet, piggy” as she attempted to ask about the Jeffrey Epstein issue.
But Trump also made an instructive aside that speaks to a simmering issue in the US media landscape: the $US111 billion merger between David Ellison’s Paramount Skydance – which already owns CBS – and Warner Bros Discovery, the owner of CNN.
The deal was approved by shareholders earlier this year, but still requires approval by federal and international regulators.
Trump has made no secret of the fact he hopes Ellison – with whom he is close – will radically change CNN’s coverage, which is generally regarded as slightly left-leaning, though less so than in times past.
“Now they have new ownership so maybe it’ll straighten it out,” he said while criticising Collins. “I doubt it. It’s hard to straighten garbage out.” The remark appeared almost like a challenge to Ellison.
Opposition to the merger is growing, both legally and politically. Paramount is seeking to dismiss a California lawsuit that claims the merger would violate the Clayton Antitrust Act, which bars mergers that significantly reduce competition.
In Congress, a group of Democratic senators led by Massachusetts’ Elizabeth Warren wrote to US Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent on Wednesday noting that the deal would involve $US24 billion in finance from sovereign wealth funds of Saudi Arabia, Abu Dhabi and Qatar.
“This funding structure could provide foreign entities with access to the sensitive personal data of millions of Americans and significant influence over what would be one of the nation’s largest media and entertainment conglomerates,” they wrote.
Warren and co sought Bessent’s commitment that the merger would be subject to review by the Committee on Foreign Investment in the United States, which examines such deals for their national security implications.
Michael Sozan and Andrew Miller at the Centre for American Progress, a progressive think tank, also note the three Middle Eastern countries anchoring the deal are involved in numerous, significant business deals with Trump’s sons and family business.
The merger “is indefensible on antitrust grounds alone, but the fact that it would be financed by foreign regimes with lucrative financial relationships with President Trump and his family, while being hostile to the American way of life, makes it particularly troubling”, they wrote this week.
CNN’s own media analyst Brian Stelter noted that Trump’s pressure campaign for Ellison to overhaul CNN was “happening right in front of our faces”.
For now, it appears unsuccessful: Collins presented her story on the so-called anti-weaponisation fund later that evening “unabated and unconstrained”.
Throughout the interaction with Trump, she remained unfazed and pressed for an answer on whether the fund was permanently cancelled or merely on hold. The president said he did not know, and would have to ask the government’s lawyers. Acting attorney-general Todd Blanche has said the fund won’t proceed.
Meanwhile, one of Trump’s former press advisers said the president’s treatment of Collins stemmed from fear.
Appearing on CNN on Wednesday night (US time), Sarah Matthews, who was deputy press secretary in the first Trump administration, said the president and then-press secretary Kayleigh McEnany were “scared” of Collins more than any other White House journalist.
“Kaitlan Collins is a very, very good reporter, she’s the best at what she does, and I think that’s why you see Trump go after her more ferociously than any other reporter in that room,” Matthews said.
The ex-Trump aide called his interaction with Collins misogynistic and “disgusting”, and lamented that the behaviour had become so frequent it did not garner much attention.
“I wish that this wasn’t normalised and that we weren’t desensitised to this type of behaviour from the president, but it really is appalling,” Matthews said.
The White House did not respond to questions and directed this masthead to Trump’s comments in the Oval Office on Wednesday. The White House Correspondents’ Association was contacted for comment.
A CNN spokesperson said Collins was an exceptional journalist who reported with depth and tenacity. “She skilfully brings that reporting to the anchor chair and CNN platforms every day, which audiences around the world know they can trust.”
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Michael Koziol is the North America correspondent for The Age and Sydney Morning Herald. He is a former Sydney editor, Sun-Herald deputy editor and a federal political reporter in Canberra.Connect via X or email.