See Trump attack CNN’s Kaitlan Collins in the Oval Office
President Donald Trump attacked CNN’s Kaitlan Collins, saying she has “hatred in her eyes.”
Kaitlan Collins is not sweating President Donald Trump continuing to insult her.
CNN’s chief White House reporter told “The Daily Show” host Jon Stewart that she wasn’t shocked by Trump’s speech at the rescheduled White House Correspondents’ Association dinner on Friday, July 24, in which the president took a dig at the award-winning reporter.
“That happens pretty regularly inside the Oval Office,” Collins, 34, told Stewart. “What was most surprising to me was the room was filled with a lot of his staffers, his Cabinet, his allies, Republicans in Congress. It was so quiet in the room during the president’s remarks.”
In his speech, the president said he wanted to “personally congratulate” her for receiving an award earlier in the night before adding that the honor was “fake and all about him.” Collins won the award for her reporting on Trump’s tense 2025 Oval Office meeting with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy.
Trump also went on to comment about Collins’ appearance and compared her to transgender media personality Dylan Mulvaney. “I thought Kaitlan had really made it big with a major new sponsorship. But then I informed her that it wasn’t her on the Bud Light can, it was Dylan Mulvaney,” he said. Days later, the president posted an AI-generated image to Truth Social of Collins’ head on Mulvaney’s body.
Stewart applauded Collins for remaining “unflappable” when covering the president, despite being called “terrible” and “stupid.”
“That’s why I ask the questions the way I do,” Collins said. “I don’t want it to only serve one audience or one political leaning. I want anyone, from my family in Alabama to people in the White House, to people in Washington, to be able to hear that answer or hear that question and think, ‘What is the answer to that?'”
“Well, the answer is very clearly you should smile more,” Stewart quipped.
As for why she never gets angry and is seemingly able to “detach” during unpleasant interactions with Trump, Collins said, “It’s really not about me, and I don’t want it to be about my reaction.”
She continued, “I just think in those moments, it’s important to put the reminder back on the work, on the question, and on the non-answers that we get.”
Contributing: Karissa Waddick and Greta Cross, USA TODAY