‘Young beautiful woman, never smiles’: Trump attacks journalist again amid battle for CNN |
‘Young beautiful woman, never smiles’: Trump attacks journalist again amid battle for CNN
June 5, 2026 — 11:42am
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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........