CNN panel heaps praise on 70-year-old Trump for acting 'grown up' by calling Elizabeth Warren a racist

When the Supreme Court announced its decision against the Texas abortion law, GOP presidential candidate Donald Trump's Twitter account was silent. Just half an hour later when Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-MA) took the podium at a Cincinnati rally and attacked Trump calling him out for whining on Twitter about "fat pigs" or "dummies" who oppose him. Trump's Twitter account still sat silent.

Instead, Trump's campaign sent out a press release and the candidate spoke to an NBC News reporter where he refrained from calling Warren "Pocahontas," as he has in the past, and instead called her the racist.

CNN wasn't shocked. They didn't assume the alleged "thin-skinned," "bully" had finally spontaneously combusted in anger. Instead, the panel rejoiced that the self-professed billionaire had finally matured.

"He has been calling Elizabeth Warren, 'Pocahontas,' repeatedly," Brianna Keilar said. "This is the more grown up way to put what he is — what his allegation is."

Nia-Malika Henderson agreed, saying that it was a kind of "mature version of a non-fifth grade version of the 'Pocahontas' — what some people think is an insult." It is unclear if she meant that Trump had graduated to more middle-school attacks like "I know you are but what am I."

"He is talking about policy, he is saying she is a sellout to the cause," Henderson continued. "I do think we are seeing a slow maturation of Donald Trump. Again, he sort of is still doing the same thing calling her goofy, nodding to the heritage. Which is sort of a weird thing, we don't typically talk about people's ethnic backgrounds in presidential politics. But, this is where he is."

"You see this creeping professionalism, professionalization of Trump's campaign, where he personally, when he tweets, it is usually sort of a, frankly, a schoolyard taunt," Ryan Lizza explained. "If you look at the stuff they are sending out in press releases that is done by the campaign, it is a little bit more of a targeted, the way to get at Elizabeth Warren is to argue she is selling out her principles by endorsing Clinton."

The Republican National Committee released a strategy memo, where it outlined that they intend to pit supporters of Bernie Sanders against Hillary Clinton in efforts to divide the Democratic party to conquer them. Insulting Warren as a "sell out" is presumably part of this strategy.

Another NBC News reporter was quick to wag a finger at those who treat Trump's maturity as a strategy shift simply because he didn't reply with a racist statement. Others were quick to criticize it as "the bigotry of low expectations."

Check out the video below thanks to Media Matters