'Whoa!' CNN host reacts to 'scary' encounter with Trump's 'secretary of retribution'

CNN's Jessica Dean was shaken by video of an encounter between one of her colleagues and president Donald Trump's self-proclaimed "secretary of retribution."

Senior correspondent Donie O'Sullivan has been investigating the surge of misinformation and extremism, and his reporting took him to the Republican and Democratic national conventions, Mike Lindell’s pillow factory, a QAnon church and a JFK conspiracy convention, and he previewed his new special, "MisinfoNation," on "CNN News Central" with a clip of his interaction with Trump ally Ivan Raiklin.

"You mentioned [Rep. Nancy] Pelosi," O'Sullivan said. "What do you think she would be charged with in this scenario?"

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Raiklin, a retired Green Beret and self-described "constitutional lawyer," claims the Jan. 6 insurrection was a setup and maintains a "deep-state target list" of roughly 300 people he would target for prosecution, and he told O'Sullivan the former House speaker was guilty of treason.

"It's a simple statute," Raiklin said. "This is treason. Yeah, absolutely, and I would like to see at the end of the due process, lawful capital punishment."

O'Sullivan asked whether he would be disappointed if no one has been executed for treason by next year, and Raiklin suggested the CNN correspondent might be among those targeted for prosecution.

"I think the nation will be furious," Raiklin said. "I'm not sure yet if you are or are not on the deep state target list, because I haven't consumed all of the information that you've put forth to determine what your status should be."

"As we ruin you," Raiklin added, clenching his jaw tightly to cause muscles near his temples to flex, "just like you ruined us. An eye for an eye, look up Leviticus, as a Christian man."

Back in CNN's studios, Dean was creeped out by Raiklin's cold-eyed threat.

"Whoa!" she said. "Donie, you're here now with us. What more can we expect in this new installment of your reporting? Because that's – that is scary."

"I always get to hang out with some of the nicest people," O'Sullivan replied. "As you know, this special is coming on the 30-year anniversary this month of the Oklahoma City bombing, of course, which was, by Timothy McVeigh, who bombed the federal building in Oklahoma back in 1995 and, really, what we're looking at is how over the past 30 years how the revolution in technology and social media and also how we consume and share information, how really much more easier it is to be radicalized in America today."

O'Sullivan's full report will air Sunday at 8 p.m. on "The Whole Story with Anderson Cooper."

Watch below or click the link here.

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