'They weren't going to boo an answer': Trump town hall audience reportedly only allowed to applaud

Donald Trump's town hall hosted by CNN in New Hampshire sparked criticism for its content, but also for the reactions from the audience. Now it has been reported that the spectator reactions were controlled, and that, while applause were allowed, booing wasn't.

Trump on Thursday took to Truth Social to defend CNN amid the backlash, which saw the news network being accused of platforming someone who tried to destroy it. Among other things, viewers complained that CNN had reportedly stacked the audience with 400 voters defined as sympathetic to Trump.

But those voters may not have been as sympathetic as they sounded, according to a conversation between Puck News senior political correspondent Tara Palmeri and Matthew Bartlett, who served at the U.S. Department of State.

"On CNN, it sure looked like Trump won over the crowd during his town hall interview with Kaitlan Collins," it reads. "But the reality was different in the room—and in the state of New Hampshire."

When asked about whether there were ground rules for the audience, the individual present stated that the network "did some warm up with the audience ahead of time." That included the floor manager guiding spectators on how to respond, and how not to respond, according to the interview.

"The floor manager came out ahead of time and said, Please do not boo, please be respectful. You were allowed to applaud. And I think that set the tone where people were going to try their best to keep this between the navigational beacons, and that if they felt compelled to applaud, they would, but they weren't going to have an outburst or they weren't going to boo an answer."

Bartlett went on to say that, while he doesn't know how it looked on camera, he does feel "as if [Trump] lost the audience" when talking about his tweets and other subjects.